The Nation - News from April 25, 1988

Former White House aide Lt. Col. Oliver L. North may have lied to FBI agents in May, 1986, to get them to investigate people he believed threatened to expose his secret Contra-aid network, newly released FBI documents and sources close to the inquiry say. North told the FBI he had been followed, that his car was vandalized and his dog poisoned, the documents showed. He also said key associates in his Contra-aid network were being sued in a bid to disrupt their support for the Nicaraguan rebels. Associate Executive FBI Director Oliver Revell told Congress in sworn testimony, made public last week, that in early 1986 he turned aside a North request for an investigation of several people he perceived to be political adversaries. FBI agents determined North had repeatedly lied to them, and associates of North said his dog was not poisoned but died of cancer.