Whitworth Admitted Spying in Letters to FBI, His Lawyer Says

Accused spy Jerry A. Whitworth wrote four anonymous letters to the FBI in 1984 admitting his involvement in espionage and offering to expose it in return for immunity from prosecution, Whitworth’s lawyer said Thursday.

“I will not quibble with you. . . . The writer of the ‘RUS’ letters was Jerry Whitworth,” defense lawyer James Larson told jurors, referring to four letters signed, “RUS, Somewhere USA,” that were mailed to the FBI in San Francisco between May and August, 1984.

Larson added that by the time Whitworth sent the letters, which have been entered into evidence at the trial, Whitworth had stopped supplying highly classified U.S. Navy code information to confessed Soviet spy John A. Walker, who had recruited Whitworth into the spy operation a decade earlier.

Despite Larson’s startling admission in his closing statement to jurors, the lawyer insisted that the letters, once described by the trial judge as a virtual confession, did not prove the crucial requirement of the prosecution’s case: That Whitworth knew, or had reason to believe, that the secrets he sold to Walker were bound for the Soviet Union.

When Larson finished, Assistant U.S. Atty. William (Buck) Farmer told jurors that such “amazing concessions” meant their job should be easy.

Farmer, after recounting the importance of secret military codes and the danger created by their release, pointed to Whitworth and snarled, “That is the traitor.”

“You can put the label of ‘traitor’ on Jerry Whitworth’s forehead, 13 times,” Farmer told the jury, referring to the 13 counts against Whitworth.

The bearded and bespectacled native of rural Oklahoma sat impassively, as he has throughout the 3 1/2-month trial. Finally, after Farmer finished his emotional attack, Whitworth turned to his wife, who was seated in the front row, and stared.

Jurors were to begin deliberating this morning.

Larson urged jurors to acquit Whitworth, 46, of seven espionage counts, which accuse him of passing information to harm the United States or help the Soviet Union. Each carries a sentence of life in prison.

Larson hopes instead that jurors will find Whitworth guilty of the lesser charge implicit in the seven spy counts: That of disclosing code information. The lesser crime carries with it a maximum of 10 years in prison.

He acknowledged that Whitworth passed codes to Walker, who was the key prosecution witness at the trial but said his client thought the information was going to help Israel. Larson asked jurors to believe that Whitworth acted “in the benevolent and mistaken belief the classified information he passed was going to an ally.”

Larson also said Whitworth failed to pay taxes on $332,000 he earned from his activity. Whitworth faces five tax evasion counts, each carrying a maximum term of five years in prison.

The so-called RUS letters began arriving at the FBI office in San Francisco in May, 1984, a year before the spy ring was broken. The FBI did not believe the author was Whitworth until just before Walker was arrested on May 20, 1985, outside Washington.

In the letters, Whitworth said he had been spying for several years and described a ring that had been operating for 20 years. Whitworth acknowledged that the ring supplied information to the Soviets but said that he had not known that when he began, a point that Larson emphasized.

The defense lawyer also emphasized that Whitworth, who did not testify, said in the letters that he had felt remorse since he realized that the information was going to the Soviets.

Whitworth finally stopped sending the letters in August, saying he had been naive to think that he could remain anonymous and that there was no reason to think that the ring would ever be broken.