12 Iran-Contra Charges Combined in Single Indictment Against Secord

A federal judge on Friday rejected arguments by Iran-Contra figure Richard V. Secord and combined 12 criminal charges against him into a single indictment.

Chief U.S. District Judge Aubrey E. Robinson Jr. took three counts against Secord involving accusations of illegal gifts to former National Security Council aide Oliver L. North and consolidated them with nine new charges accusing Secord of lying to Congress.

Profit Cover-Up Alleged

The alleged lies involve covering up Secord’s own profits in the Iran-Contra affair and denying that North received any benefits from the maze of corporations known as the Enterprise set up by Secord and business partner Albert A. Hakim.

North, who enlisted Secord to run arms to the Nicaraguan rebels during a congressional ban on military aid to the Contras, was convicted last month of accepting a $13,800 home security system from Secord. North faces sentencing on June 23 for that and two other crimes in the Iran-Contra scandal.

The government says Secord’s profits from running arms to the Contras and assisting the Ronald Reagan Administration’s secret Iran arms initiative totaled more than $1 million.

Consolidating the 1988 gratuities charges against Secord, a retired Air Force major general, with the nine-count indictment brought in April will serve “the interests of judicial economy and sound administration,” Robinson said.

Secord’s lawyer, Thomas C. Green, argued in favor of trying Secord on the gratuities charges alone. He said the new indictment is laden with potential problems over the use of classified information, which “will delay any trial . . . . In short, consolidation will not result in any judicial economy.”