ELECTIONS ’92 : Bush Aide Details Alleged Perot Sting : Politics: GOP’s Texas campaign chairman claims billionaire enlisted the FBI and a private citizen in an unsuccessful effort to sell him purloined documents.

The chairman of President Bush’s campaign in Texas charged Wednesday that independent presidential candidate Ross Perot, acting on a vendetta against him, enlisted both the FBI and a private citizen to make an unsuccessful effort to entrap him in illegal activity.

James Oberwetter’s detailed story of how two different men tried to sell him purloined documents, supposedly taken from Perot’s office, casts in a new light the allegations made by Perot on CBS’ “60 Minutes” on Sunday night that the Bush campaign was trying to wiretap his telephones.

Oberwetter charged that Perot not only took the wiretapping charges to the FBI, but personally hatched the entrapment scheme because he was angry about a critical statement Oberwetter made earlier this year about Perot’s presidential campaign.

Perot has said he went to the FBI with evidence of an alleged Bush campaign plot to wiretap his telephones, but he has never acknowledged asking authorities to entrap Oberwetter in criminal activity.

“I don’t know anything about that,” Perot said on “60 Minutes.” “I turned it over to them . . . and walked away from it.”

On Wednesday, the Dallas Morning News quoted unnamed police sources as saying that Perot also tried to enlist the Dallas police in an effort to entrap Oberwetter. But the story was denied by Dallas Police Chief Bill Rathburn and Clay Mulford, Perot’s son-in-law and counsel to the presidential campaign.

Oberwetter, at a news conference, demanded an apology from both Perot and the FBI for their efforts to lure him into illegal activity.

“It is the responsibility of Mr. Perot to tell me everything he has done to try and put me in the jailhouse,” Oberwetter said. “I hope he’ll call me and apologize to me . . . for these slanders.”

The FBI has acknowledged that it sent an agent to offer Oberwetter materials supposedly taken from Perot’s office. FBI officials have offered to meet with Oberwetter after the Nov. 3 election to discuss the matter.

Oberwetter conceded that in blaming Perot for the entrapment scheme, he was relying primarily on circumstantial evidence.

He said there were still a few more “rocks” to be overturned in getting to the truth of what happened, but he added: “‘With every rock that turned over, we end up nearer and nearer the door of Ross Perot. . . . I am convinced that I have been the object of an attack by Mr. Perot.”

Oberwetter said he was singled out for harassment by Perot because the Texas billionaire was angry about a statement Oberwetter made to the New York Times earlier this year. He said he told the newspaper, “As smart a guy as this is, if he wants to run for President, he’s going to have to get some good advisers and he’s going to have to listen to them, which is hard for Mr. Perot.”

Oberwetter recalled that two men came to him separately in early August, trying to sell him materials that were allegedly purloined from the Texas billionaire’s office. In both cases, Oberwetter said, he refused to take the materials.

Oberwetter identified his first visitor as Scott T. Barnes, 38, a man whom Perot has identified as a “friend” and who claimed he was contacted by the Bush campaign about wiretapping Perot’s office. Barnes is known to authorities as a discredited gadfly who specializes in off-beat investigations.

Oberwetter said Barnes showed up at his Dallas office without an appointment on Aug. 6, identified himself as “Howard Parsons” and asked to talk to him outside the building.

The two men sat together on a park bench outside of Oberwetter’s office at Hunt Oil Co., he said, and Barnes offered him information allegedly gleaned from wiretaps of Perot’s office. Oberwetter said he declined the offer.

Oberwetter’s rendezvous with Barnes apparently was videotaped by an unknown person. Don Hewitt, producer of “60 Minutes,” said Perot told him the tape provides persuasive evidence that the Bush campaign was trying to enlist Barnes in an effort to wiretap Perot’s office.

After Oberwetter’s meeting with Barnes, Perot then introduced Barnes to FBI officials in Dallas, according to law enforcement sources. Barnes is said to have told the FBI that Oberwetter asked him to wiretap Perot.

On Aug. 10, according to Oberwetter, another man showed up at his office without an appointment and offered to sell him tapes of recorded conversations of Perot. He said this man--later identified as an undercover FBI agent--was dressed as a cowboy and called himself Bob Watson. He told Oberwetter he had been hired by Barnes to wiretap Perot.