Shredding Not Cover-Up Move, Fawn Hall Says

Fawn Hall testified today that she never considered her shredding, altering and removing sensitive documents from Lt. Col. Oliver L. North’s files to be part of a cover-up as the Iran- contra scandal unraveled last fall. “I use the word protect, “ she said.

In occasionally contentious testimony at the end of the first, six-week phase of Congress’ televised hearings, Hall at one point said her activity was justified because “sometimes you have to go above the written law.”

She swiftly retracted that, saying a few moments later, “I don’t feel that.”

But she retracted none of her support for North, describing him as every secretary’s dream to work for, praising his hard work and patriotism.

North and former National Security Adviser John M. Poindexter are expected to be called to testify under limited immunity once the hearings resume June 22.

Hall’s congressional questioners repeatedly asked about North telling her to alter four documents on Nov. 21 and their jointly shredding an 18-inch stack of documents the same day.

Asked by Sen. Warren B. Rudman (R-N.H.) why she shredded documents and removed papers from North’s office in a surreptitious manner as the Iran-contra affair was exposed, she replied that she was trying “to protect the initiative.”

“Who were you protecting it from?” Rudman asked.

“We were trying to get back the hostages and we were dealing with moderates (in Iran) and . . . I just felt there would be a lot of damage done if a lot of top-secret sensitive classified material was exposed in public so the Soviets and everyone else could read it,” she said.

“Well it wasn’t the KGB that was coming, Miss Hall, it was the FBI,” Rudman replied.

She challenged Sen. William S. Cohen (R-Me.) when he said North does not have a “right” to receive immunity in exchange for his testimony.

“I think that Col. North is a U.S. citizen and has the same rights as you yourself, sir,” she said.

When Cohen repied that someone can be granted immunity, but no one is entitled to it, Hall said, “If the idea is to complete the investigation, why not grant Col. North immunity?”

“If he was not engaged in any wrongdoing, Miss Hall, then we wouldn’t have to be involved with the question of immunity at all,” Cohen said.

“We have our separate opinions,” she said.