Miller Wasn’t Just Weak but Corrupt, Prosecution Says

U.S. Atty. Robert C. Bonner concluded final arguments Thursday in the espionage trial of Richard W. Miller, saying the fired FBI agent was not just weak, as the defense contended, but corrupt.

U.S. District Judge David Kenyon said he would give the jury its instructions this morning and then turn the case over for deliberations on seven counts of espionage.

“I ask you not to let this man walk away on even a single count,” Bonner said at the end of his closing argument.

He said Miller was “not only morally weak but was already corrupted” when he became entangled with a Soviet woman.

He told jurors that Miller’s actions two years before in selling FBI information to a private detective showed that he was willing to break the law for money.

Earlier, Bonner reminded jurors that they had heard an attorney compare Miller to Ralph Kramden, the Jackie Gleason character in “The Honeymooners.”

Both Overweight

“It’s cute,” Bonner said, “but the only comparison between Ralph Kramden and Richard Miller is they were both overweight. Ralph Kramden wasn’t disloyal to his wife. He wasn’t disloyal to his country. We’re not talking about Ralph Kramden in this case. We’re talking about Richard Miller.”

The defense has contended that Miller, through his liaison with Soviet emigre Svetlana Ogorodnikova, meant to infiltrate the Soviet KGB, not to commit espionage against his own country.

“That story was baloney. It was not only baloney then, it’s still baloney,” Bonner said.

Miller “knew the basics” after 20 years with the FBI, Bonner said.

“He knew, for instance, you don’t have sex with a female asset (source), a Soviet emigre whose loyalties were in question. He knew that was a no-no,” Bonner said. “Every FBI agent knows that.”

Miller faces a life sentence if convicted as the first FBI agent ever charged with espionage, accused of turning over classified information for $65,000 in cash and gold. Ogorodnikova and her husband, Nikolai Ogorodnikov, pleaded guilty to conspiracy in the case and have been sentenced to prison.

Bonner said he agreed with the defense that Miller was a misfit in the FBI but sternly advised jurors that they were not to consider whether the FBI should have fired him long ago.

“The question of whether Mr. Miller should have been fired is not an issue for you as jurors to decide,” he said.

In opening statements to the jury last August, attorney Stanley Greenberg had told jurors that Miller did not fit the portrait of an FBI agent conveyed on the TV series “The FBI” by actor Efrem Zimbalist Jr.

“Picture Ralph Kramden without the humor and you’ve got it,” Greenberg told them.

Detailed Response

Bonner, in an unusually long closing response, attempted to answer, point by point, the questions raised by defense attorney Joel Levine in his summation.

Levine had stressed the need to determine whether Miller intended to become a spy. Bonner said that was not critical to the case.

“The ‘Miller intent’ defense is kind of a bamboozle,” Bonner said. “The contention is he was all the time doing things for the FBI and his country. It’s implausible on its face.”

“We do not have to prove Mr. Miller was the best spy in the world or that he acted intelligent at all times,” the prosecutor said. “Like most people who engage in criminal activity, they do some dumb things.”

He reiterated several key government arguments. He noted that Miller was the perfect target for KGB recruitment because he was “resentful, isolated and felt unjustly treated.”

Confession to Agents

He reminded jurors that Miller himself had confessed his actions in detail to six agents and even drew a diagram of where he stood when he showed a classified document to Ogorodnikova in the bedroom of his home.