Meese: Didn’t Block Probe Into Contra Gun-Running

Atty. Gen. Edwin Meese III today denied that he blocked a politically sensitive investigation into alleged gun-running to the contras last year as Congress was preparing to vote on whether to resume aid to the Nicaraguan guerrilla force.

At a news conference, the attorney general acknowledged that he discussed the gun-running probe with the U.S. attorney in Miami, Leon Kellner, last April. Meese also said that his deputy at the time, D. Lowell Jensen, “may have briefed me periodically” about the criminal probe in Miami.

But Meese flatly rejected suggestions that he blocked indictments or that he was urged to do so by then-National Security Adviser John M. Poindexter.

He said that the gun-smuggling case was treated the same as “any other investigation that makes the news and which therefore might be the subject of things I ought to know to answer questions” from reporters.

In Grand Jury Phase

The probe, which began early last year, is now in the grand jury phase, and no indictments have been issued.

The attorney general said he did not talk to Poindexter about the investigation and “I have no recollection of this ever coming up in any conversation” with anyone at the NSC or at the White House.

An article last month in the Village Voice said that at Poindexter’s request, Meese personally intervened last spring to prevent the filing of indictments by Kellner against people allegedly smuggling arms from Florida to the contras in Nicaragua.

Meese said the report is “absolutely false” and added that he made the inquiries of Kellner because of news reports on the investigation, not because of the upcoming vote in Congress on military aid to the contras. Congress ultimately acquiesced to requests from the Reagan Administration and renewed military assistance to the contras, ending a two-year ban.