Deaver Ordered to Assist Programs for Alcoholics

Former Reagan White House aide Michael K. Deaver was ordered to assist local alcoholism treatment programs for his conviction for lying to Congress about his post-government lobbying, court papers showed today.

U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson also granted Deaver time from his current probation to travel to Moscow next month to a superpower conference on alcoholism.

Deaver was convicted in December, 1987, of lying to Congress and a federal grand jury about his lobbying activities after leaving his job as President Ronald Reagan’s deputy chief of staff.

At his trial, he claimed that the false statements he was accused of making were the product of alcoholism. In his book, “Behind the Scenes,” he recalled that, shortly before leaving the White House in May, 1985, he drank as much as a quart of Scotch each day.

Deaver is recovering from alcoholism. He was sentenced last September to three years’ probation and 1,500 hours of community service. Jackson’s orders approved a plan for Deaver to serve that time at two alcoholism treatment programs in the nation’s capital.