Target of Discredited FBI Probe Sues to Ban Use of Information

A group opposed to the Administration’s Central America policies sued the FBI Tuesday, seeking to bar use of information gathered during the agency’s discredited investigation of the organization and to wrest control of files collected during the inquiry.

In the suit, the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador also challenged FBI Director William S. Sessions’ congressional testimony that the FBI investigation began in error, contending that it was purposely conducted to defeat opposition to the Administration’s foreign policy.

Margaret L. Ratner, an attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights, which brought the suit on behalf of CISPES and persons and organizations whose names went into FBI files during the two-year investigation, said that the suit seeks “to focus attention on the fact the FBI does indeed engage in political spying.”

Sessions, in Senate and House testimony, denied that the investigation was politically motivated, but acknowledged that it relied too heavily on an informant found to be unreliable, was too broad and one of which the FBI is not proud. He invited persons and groups whose names were recorded in the investigation to request deletion of that information from FBI files.

Dissatisfied With Offer

But Ratner, at a press conference announcing the suit, said that this offer falls short because it makes no provision for individuals who did not know their names had been recorded. Moreover, “most of our clients have a sense of history and don’t want the files expunged without knowing what’s in there,” she added.

An FBI spokesman said that under orders from Sessions, senior FBI officials had developed criteria for preventing dissemination of information gathered during the investigation to other government agencies but that they had not yet been submitted to Sessions for approval.

The suit seeks a court order preventing the FBI from further using information gathered during the inquiry and requiring the bureau to retrieve all documents that it has disseminated and deposit all the files in the National Archives.

Declaration Sought

While Sessions testified that he did not think constitutional violations occurred, the suit asked for a court declaration that the FBI activities violated the plaintiffs’ First Amendment rights of expression and association, Fifth Amendment “liberty interests” and the Privacy Act.

As evidence that the FBI inquiry was politically motivated, the suit cited an FBI document that stated: “It is imperative at this time to formulate some plan of attack against CISPES and specifically against individuals (deletion) who defiantly display their contempt for the U.S. government by making speeches propagandizing their cause while asking for political asylum.”