U.S. Judge Sets Start of North’s Trial for Jan. 31

A federal judge on Wednesday set the trial date for former White House aide Oliver L. North for Jan. 31, but lingering problems concerning the use of classified documents could still postpone or cancel the long-awaited event.

U.S. District Judge Gerhard A. Gesell set the date for the first of the Iran-Contra trials at the end of an hourlong pretrial hearing. North’s co-counsel, Barry Simon, asked for a firm date because he wants to subpoena as witnesses many Reagan Administration officials who soon may be scattered “to the four corners of the Earth.”

“Fine, we’ll set a date,” Gesell said abruptly, announcing Jan. 31. Simon then protested on grounds that it left too little time to assimilate new documents he hopes to obtain under subpoena.

Prosecution Seeks to Comply

But John W. Keker, who was named last week by independent counsel Lawrence E. Walsh as chief prosecutor for the trial, said after the hearing: “We certainly hope we can meet that date.”

The Jan. 31 trial date is the second that Gesell has set for the retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel and fired National Security Council aide, one of four defendants who have been indicted in the Iran-Contra scandal. He had to scrap a Sept. 20 date because problems relating to sensitive government documents defied a quick solution.

Gesell has given North’s attorneys until Jan. 3 to pare down their request for 3,500 classified documents to 300, or roughly the same number that the prosecution is planning to use. In a stern order last week, Gesell said that North and his attorneys were trying to “frustrate” the case by demanding many more sensitive documents than they really need.

But the judge indicated Wednesday that he might approve defense subpoenas for additional documents if the lawyers carefully describe the particular memos and reports they want.

Panel Studies Data

Meanwhile, an inter-agency committee of government security analysts has been meeting with prosecutors in response to Gesell’s order to Walsh to restore some of the sensitive information that has been deleted, at the insistence of government intelligence agencies, from the documents that Walsh wants to introduce at trial.

It is this kind of problem that some lawyers believe could lead to cancellation of North’s trial. If Reagan Administration officials refuse to restore censored parts of documents or to comply with new subpoenas from North’s lawyers, they say, Gesell could be forced to throw out the principal charges against North.

North has been charged with fraud and conspiracy for allegedly “corrupting” President Reagan’s arms-for-hostages initiative in 1985 and 1986 by diverting $12 million in Iranian arms sale proceeds to Nicaragua’s Contras without approval by the President or Congress.

North’s lawyers have argued that the introduction of top secret documents relating to other covert operations would help convince a jury that North had reason to believe his Nicaraguan activities had high-level government approval.

Drug Trafficking Cited

Keker told Gesell that he might renew the prosecution’s efforts to obtain 2,800 pages of notes North took while running the Iran-Contra operation. Heavily censored excerpts from the notebooks previously given to congressional investigators contain references to drug trafficking, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the CIA.

North is expected to invoke his right against self-incrimination and to resist turning over his handwritten notes.

Gesell said Wednesday that all problems of classification, including what witnesses may say in open court, must be resolved before trial. Otherwise, he said, intelligence agency officials in the courtroom would object at every turn.

“I don’t see how a trial can be run with a bunch of experts sitting in the back jumping up and down every time a possible security violation is mentioned,” Gesell told prosecutors.