A Problem of Morale

When an FBI agent was subpoenaed recently by the Senate committee investigating domestic spying by federal agencies, he asked his bosses in Washington for guidance. Their response: You're on your own. The agent promptly hired his own attorney, whose fees will be paid partly by contributions that have been offered by other FBI agents.

Trivial as that incident may sound to outsiders, it lies at the heart of a growing morale problem among the bureau's 8,000 special agents. Increasingly, as their activities are scrutinized by investigators from Congress and the Justice Department, agents feel that they have been abandoned by their superiors. The agents are particularly apprehensive about Attorney General Edward Levi's continuing efforts to put tighter controls on FBI investigations. Levi has slashed the agency's requested 1976 budget increase for counterespionage activities from $11 million to $4.4 million, opened up certain secret files to congressional probers, and criticized past FBI excesses as "foolish and sometimes outrageous." In an attempt to deal with the resentment, TIME has learned, FBI Director Clarence M. Kelley summoned the chiefs of the bureau's 59 field offices to an extraordinary meeting in Washington last week.

His message turned out to be more startling than soothing: the FBI chief said that recently he himself had been pushed to the brink of resignation by the congressional investigations. Although details were not divulged, one committee apparently had demanded evidence that Kelley thought should not be handed over. Said a participant at the FBI meeting: "Kelley has told us in the past that he would resign if he were forced to comply with demands that he considered unreasonable. Well, he said that a few weeks ago he felt he was at that point. But he didn't quit because the incident, as he put it, 'blew over.' " The next day Kelley apparently had second thoughts and assured associates that he had no intention of resigning.

Kelley's efforts to pacify his men by sharing his troubles did not meet with much success. Neither did the explanations of Deputy U.S. Attorney General Harold R. Tyler Jr. He told the FBI meeting that the Justice Department will assist any agents who are summoned before congressional committees for actions they took while under orders. Thus far, the Senate investigating committee has subpoenaed two agents and could call another 70 to testify about various dirty tricks--wiretaps, burglaries, and the kidnaping of Soviet agents for interrogation by the CIA. But aside from future dangers, many FBI men are concerned about the Justice Department's investigation of how five agents handled a wiretapping case in Richmond, Va.

Lost Evidence. In June a maintenance man notified the FBI's Richmond office that he had discovered a wiretapping device on the telephone line of Jamil Ramaden, a radio salesman of Palestinian ancestry. The device turned out to belong to the Richmond police department, which had not bothered to get a court order. (The reasons for the tap have never been disclosed.) Even so, Assistant U.S. Attorney G. Rodney Sager decided not to prosecute the case after he was told that there was no proof that the tap had ever been used. The agents returned the equipment to the police. A short time later, Sager investigated further, only to discover that the police department had inexplicably lost the evidence--the wiretapping device. The Justice Department promptly opened a grand jury investigation of the agents' actions and, on orders from Tyler, they were all ordered to go on leave with pay.

At last week's meeting, Tyler argued that the Justice Department investigation was the best way to forestall charges that the FBI was covering up the case. Some agents in his audience agreed, but others did not. One official later cited the probe as evidence that "Kelley doesn't have his hand on the throttle any more--the FBI is just floundering." Still, a day later, the Justice Department made a further attempt to mollify the FBI agents. Officials restored the five agents to duty but did not go so far as to call off the grand jury investigation.

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