r Argosy: Jul 69

p. 28 - Hoffa's plot to kill Robert F. Kennedy

Clark R. Mollonhoff

ORE I F. KINNE

Article by CLARK R. MOLLENHOFF

111OFFA'S PET

TO KILL Jimmy Hoffa wasn't an easy man to nail down, but the

Federal Government finally did it in 1963. Perhaps the most incredible characteristic of that case was this: In order to get a conviction, the prosecution had to keep the jury from learning that Hoffa had plotted to assassinate the Attorney General of the United States, Robert F. Kennedy. Now the story can be told.

In May, 1963, a Federal grand jury in Nashville returned an indictment charging that James R. Hoffa and six others had at-tempted to bribe members of the jury that had tried Hoffa a few months earl ier.

Hoffa's lawyers had reason to be optimistic. for Jimmy had a record of demonstrating that he could be extremely effective in talking a jury into acquittal or a "hung-jury" verdict. The defense lawyers did not expect that substantial evidence could be obtained from informants, nor did they believe it would be possible to corroborate an informant if one were obtained.

If Hoffa was now worried about an informant, it was not about Edward Grady Partin of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. If there was one Teamsters official who seemed to have more problems than Hoffa, it was Partin. Ed Partin had led a rough life that included a burglary conviction, a number of jail terms, and the general rough stuff that goes with running a rough union. Even as he attended the Nashville trial, Partin still was under indict-ment on a state charge and a federal charge involving alleged mishandling of Teamsters union funds.

It appeared that Partin was thoroughly loyal to Hoffa. He had been selected by Hoffa to serve as a guard outside Hoffa's door at the Andrew Jackson Hotel in Nashville when important con-ferences were in progress. When the grand jury started the jury-tampering inquiry, Partin told Hoffa that he had been sub-poenaed, and, following advice from one of Hoffa's lawyers, Partin took the Fifth Amendment before that grand jury.

Hoffa and his lawyers were unaware that Ed Partin had been in almost daily contact with Walter Sheridan throughout the earlier Nashville trial. Walter Sheridan, a thirty-five-year-old former FBI agent and an investigator on the McClellan Commit-tee staff, was a special consultant to the Attorney General and in charge of a Special Justice Department "Hoffa Unit." It was on Sheridan's advice that Partin went along with the suggestion that he use the Fifth Amendment when questioned.

"Something has to be done about that little S.O.B., Bobby Kennedy," a government witness quotes Hoffa as saying. "He'll be an

easy target, always driving around Washington in that convertible with that big black dog. All

we need are some plastic explosives tossed in with him and that will finish him off."

26

HOFFA/KENNEDY continued

The jury-tampering trial started on January 20, 1964, in United States District Judge Frank W. Wilson's court in Chattanooga. There was the same bitterness that had per-meated the Nashville trial, but there were a few major cast changes. The government had hired John J. Hooker, Sr., one of the great trial lawyers in Tennessee, to team with James Neal of Nashville and United States Attorney John Reddy. It provided a team of Tennessee lawyers to argue to the jury about these outlanders who had corrupted the jury system in Tennessee.

The prosecution's strategy decision was made. The government planned to hold its secret witness, Ed Partin, until near the end of the case. FBI agents and other wit-nesses, most of them corroborative of Partin's story, were to be used to weave the major story in what would appear to be a circumstantial case until Ed Partin was called.

The whole set of circumstances under which Partin had decided to co-operate with the government had to be kept from the jurors. If the government dealt with Partin's reason for becoming an informant in any but the most careful man-ner, it could result in statements that might be regarded as highly prejudicial to Hoffa.

The story Ed Partin told of why he became an informant was more chilling than the tale of Teamsters jury-tampering. It started on a morning in late September, 1962.

Captain Thomas T. Edwards, warden in Louisiana's East Baton Rouge parish jail, had heard much of criminal con-spiracy in his sixteen years in the sheriff's office, but noth-ing had been more astounding to him than the story Ed Partin told the morning of September 29, 1962. Partin told him of a plot to assassinate Attorney General Robert Ken-nedy with "plastic explosives." It was a story that seemed too fantastic for belief, but Partin insisted that it was true.

Partin was a prisoner in the Baton Rouge jail, held on a kidnapping charge that had grown out of a friend's domestic squabble. Captain Edwards called the home of William H. (Billy) Daniels, an assistant to District Attorney Sargent Pitcher. Within an hour, Daniels arrived at the courthouse and took the elevator to the fourth-floor jail.

Along with Daniels, Partin poured out his story. A few weeks earlier, he said, when he had been in Washington at the International Teamsters headquarters, he had been called into an office there and asked about obtaining plastic explosives for the assassination of the Attorney General.

"Something has to be done about that little S.O.B., Bobby Kennedy." Partin quoted Jimmy Hoffa as saying. "He'll be an easy target, always driving around Washington in that convertible with that big black dog. All we need are some plastic explosives tossed in with him, and that wilt finish him off."

Partin said he had been told that day that some thought was also being given to using the plastic explosives on the Robert Kennedy home at McLean, Virginia.

The muscular Louisiana Teamster said he assumed he had been approached because those involved in the plot believed he was in so much trouble over federal criminal indictments that he would find the plan acceptable. He ex-plained to his Baton Rouge listeners that some of the top Teamsters also knew he was a gun fancier, with a private gun collection, who might have convenient access to sources for explosives. Partin said he was asked to obtain plastic explosives from sources far enough away from Washington that they could not later be traced back to those who would use them.

Ed Partin had been in the Teamsters union for a long time, and he was not inclined to be critical of the rougher elements. In his twelve years as business manager and secretary-treasurer of Local Five, Partin had become ac-customed to some flexible handling of union funds and the condoning of a bit of minor violence when that was neces- EXCERPTED BY PERMISSION OF THE WORLD PUBLISHING CO.. FROM -TENTACLES OF POWER. THE STORY OF JIMMY HOFFA BY CLARK R. MOLLENHOFF, COPY- RIGHT 1965 BY CLARK MOLLENH OFF

In 1962, powerful Bob Kennedy was determined to bring Jimmy Hoffa (above) to justice, so the Teamster boss wanted him out of the way.

sary to make a point in a union-management dispute. But the idea of assassinating anyone—and particularly the At. torney General of the United States—was too much for him .

A plastic bomb planted at the Robert Kennedy home in Virginia would also endanger the Kennedy children, and Partin had small children of his own. He said now that he had hidden his shock when the plot was mentioned, but. he told Daniels he had tried to contact Attorney General Ken-nedy and another top official. He had been brushed aside by subordinates. He emphasized that he didn't want to tell his story unless it was to go to the top people. He didn't want to take a chance that word might leak out of the Justice Department to the International Teamsters head-quarters. He didn't want to jeopardize his job as a Team-sters official or his safety by being tabbed as a "squealer."

Billy Daniels told Partin he thought he could arrange a talk with top Justice Department people, but that it would be necessary to discuss this with District Attorney Pitcher first. Daniels said he would try to return later with Pitcher.

That evening, Daniels and Pitcher returned to the East Baton Rouge Parish Building. Partin repeated his story of the assassination plot. Pitcher called New Orleans, where he reached Assistant United States Attorney Peter Duffy. Pitcher told Duffy only that Partin had related a story of a "grave matter involving national security."

Duffy made an immediate call to A. Frank Grimsley, a Justice Department lawyer from Atlanta, who had been working with the United States Attorney's office on several Teamsters matters, including the investigation that resulted in the indictment of Partin a few months earlier on a charge of misuse of union funds. Partin's name and background were familiar to Grimsley. Certainly, the subject matter was vague, but Grimsley had learned that all possibilities should be covered on the theory that only a small percentage might check through.

Grimsley called Walter Sheridan's home in Bethesda, Maryland, and without hesitation Sheridan told him to leave for Baton Rouge as quickly as possible. Whatever Ed Partin wanted to talk about would be worth the trip, for Partin had been close to Hoffa and several other key officials in the Southern Conference of Teamsters. Sheridan's unit had al-ready cultivated a half-dozen informants among the men

30 ARGOSY

trusted by Haifa, but another informant could always be helpful.

On Monday, October first, at the FBI office in the Baton Rouge Post Office Building, Pitcher and Daniels outlined the alleged assassination plot to Grimsley and Assistant U.S. Attorney Duffy. Daniels explained that it would be best not to talk to Partin during the day, Too many people might know that Partin was talking with federal officials. It might get back to the Teamsters. A jailer who could be trusted to keep his mouth shut was to come on at the midnight shift, Daniels explained.

Grimsley approved the plan, stepped out to an anteroom, called Walter Sheridan and outlined the suspected plot be-fore returning to the Capitol House Hotel for dinner and a rest before the night meeting.

It was after 2 a,m. on October second when Grimsley and Duffy returned to the East Baton Rouge Parish Building. At 3 a.m., Partin was brought from the jail to the District Attorney's office. From 3 a.m. until 6 a.m., he talked and answered questions. Grimsley, Duffy and Daniels reviewed the details over and over, and cross-examined the Louisiana Teamster on every aspect of his story of the assassination plot. Partin co-operated fully, and he seemed to be telling the truth.

Grimsley called Sheridan with the full details of the alleged assassination plot. "Do you believe him?" Sheridan asked.

Grimsley said he had first been inclined to discount the story as too incredible for belief, but he admitted that the cross-examination of Partin had convinced him that Partin was telling the truth. Partin had volunteered to take a lie-detector test, Grimsley said.

Sheridan was still skeptical. However, there were some routine things that had to be done. He notified Assistant Attorney General Herbert J. (Jack) Miller, head of the Criminal Division, Attorney General Kennedy, and the FBI. Some basic security measures were urged with regard to the Attorney General and his family, including temporary abandonment of the convertible Robert Kennedy often used. The FBI was to arrange for a lie-detector test for Partin, If this indicated that Partin was truthful, then a number of additional security measures would be taken.

The FBI report on the lie-detector test confirmed Grims-ley's view that Partin was telling the truth.

On October twentieth, Partin called lawyer Frank Grims. ley in Atlanta, told him he was going to Nashville, and asked if there was anything the Justice Department wanted him to do.

"Just keep your eyes and ears open for any evidence of jury fixing," Grimsley said. He gave Partin the unlisted tele-phone numbers of Walter Sheridan's office in Nashville and instructed him to call Sheridan on a pay phone when he had anything to report.

On October twenty-second, Partin reported that Hoffa had called him into his hotel bedroom and told him "to stick around a day or two''—that Hoffa might have one or two people for Partin to call.

"He (Haifa) said that they were going to get one juror, or try to get a few scattered jurors, and take their chances," Partin told Sheridan.

Partin said he had met Ewing King, president of the Nash-ville Teamsters local, and King then told him "they had a meeting set up on the jury that night."

On Tuesday, October twenty-third, Partin left Nashville, but before he left he called Sheridan again. Hoffa, he re-ported had "called me into his room and told me when I came back he may want me to pass something for him."

"He (Haifa) put his hand behind his pocket like that and hit his rear pocket," Partin told Sheridan.

That was Partin's story of how he decided to co-operate with the government and how he relayed to Sheridan the first information of jury-tampering that was later to be cor-

roborated by FBI agents and other witnesses. It was a story unknown to Hoffa and the defense lawyers in the first two weeks of the trial, when it seemed that a circumstantial case was being constructed and it appeared that Hoffa was ade-quately insulated against direct involvement.

For the first two weeks of this second trial, Haifa was his usual cocky self and his attorneys were highly optimistic. Then, at 1:50 p.m. on February fourth, Ed Partin, who had been hidden on the outskirts of Chattanooga for three days, stepped through the rear door of the courtroom as the principal prosecution witness.

Hoffa glowered with shock and rage. Partin was one of the last Teamsters he had expected to talk. With Hoffa prodding them, the nine defense lawyers made a frantic effort to suppress Partin's testimony.

Judge Wilson overruled the defense motions to bar testi-mony from Partin, and Special U.S. Prosecutor John L. Hooker brought out Partin's story of his talks with Hotta and others and the passing of information to Sheridan. It was this testimony that linked Hoffa to the jury-tampering that had been explained earlier by other witnesses.

The prosecuting attorney avoided questioning Partin about the assassination-plot conversations that had been a part of Partin's first contact with the Justice Department. Hooker and Neal argued that details of the assassination plot were immaterial to a trial involving jury.tampering. They wanted to bar information that might be considered as simply inflammatory and prejudicial to the rights of Hoffa and other defendants.

The prosecution's efforts to avoid those first conversa tions between Partin and Federal Attorney Grimsley only made the defense lawyers more eager to explore those talks.

Prosecutor Neal objected to their repeated efforts to do this. He asked for a closed session to explain the talks, away from the jury. In that closed session. Judge Wilson ruled that the talk of the plot was immaterial to the jury-fix trial and not to be explored. However, the defense per-sisted in open court. Harvey Silets, a lawyer for the defense, pressed Partin with questions, and Partin said, ''It con-cerned something that I've been instructed not to say."

Federal lawyers Grimsley, Daniels, and Pitcher were called to testify as defense lawyers sought evidence of in-consistency or grounds for a mistrial.

Frank Grimsley insisted that the first calls from Assistant United States Attorney Duffy concerning Partin mentioned only a "security" matter.

"Tell us what that was?" Silets coaxed him. "It doesn't pertain to this case," Grimsley replied. Judge Wilson cut in to comment: "I will allow him to tell

the subject matter of it, but it would not be appropriate to ga into the details of it, gentlemen."

"Mr. Partin stated that in a conference with Mr. Hoffa—," Grimsley started to say but was cut off by Judge Wilson, who said, "Don't go into the details of it."

"Well, Mr. Partin stated that Mr. Hoffa told him that he would like—" and again the judge cautioned Grimsley against going into the details.

"An assassination plot," Grimsley testified. Silets then tried to characterize the assassination plot

as a "contrived circumstance" and ''unsubstantiated wild charges" to hide improper schemes of wiretapping involving the Justice Department.

On cross-examination, Prosecutor James Neal tried to refute comments by Silets that tended to discredit Ed Partin and his story of an assassination plot.

"Mr. Silets talked about a wild rumor and so forth re-spective to an assassination"—Neal started his question. Then he said, "Did you or someone give Mr. Partin a lie-detector test on that?"

"The FBI gave him one, yes," Grimsley replied. "And what were the results?" "That he was teling the (continued on page 69)

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HOFFA-KENNEDY from page 3]

telling the truth." Grimsley said. Lawyer Frank Grimsley was later called

back to the witness chair to clarify a point. "Mr. Glintsley. you stated that one of the

recordings had to do with an assassination plot," Prosecutor John Hooker began. "Did it have anything to do with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy'?" Hooker in-quired.

"No sir, it did not." Grimsley answered. Walter Sheridan, who then was called by

the defense, testified: "I was furnished a report concerning this specific (assassina-tion) matter. I believe it was turned over to the court."

Sheridan said. "Instructions were given to the FBI to pursue the matter further . . . they took certain action as a result of that. . . . Each time I got information, it was turned over to the FBI. They conducted an investigation to corroborate the information —did corroborate it: then action was taken."

There was a defense effort later in this trial to use testimony of convicted criminals and disreputable women to discredit Partin as a "narcotics addict." but such testimony was contradicted by medical experts.

Hoffa, usually a smooth star witness on his own behalf, was now a snarling and argu-mentative witness under the cross-examina- tion by stentorian-toned Prosecutor Hooker. Hoffa denied discussing jury fixing with Partin.

In the prosecution's argument to the jury James Neal gave a careful analysis of the FBI testimony supporting the information Ed Partin had passed to Walter Sheridan. He and Assistant U.S. Attorney John Reddy left the dramatic close to John Hooker.

"Yours is a great responsibility." that big. voiced Nashville lawyer told the jury in his distinctive drawl. "Hoffa is the head of the largest labor union in the world. but that don't give him a license to fix a jury, and I say to you with all the sincerity at my com- mand, that Chattanooga. after more than a hundred years, has survived Chickamauga and Missionary Ridge, but Chattanooga can never survive the acquittal of those who have been proven to be guilty of contam-inating. tampering with, fixing a jury in the courts of justice in this state."

Time jury returned its verdict on March 4. 1901. finding James Riddle Hof% and three of the other defendants guilty of obstructing justice.

Judge Frank Wilson sentenced Hoffa to eight years in the Federal prison and a $10.000 fine.

Hoffa shorted lie was "innocent," but Judge Wilson declared that the evidence clearly sustained the guilty verdict.

"You stand here convicted of having tampered, really. with the very soul of the nation." Judge Wilson said. "You stand here convicted of having struck at the very foundation upon which everything else in this nation depends . . . that is the admin-istration of justice."

In Tennessee, Haifa had outsmarted him-self. He had been on trial in Nashville in 1902 on an indictable misdemeanor charge that carried a maximum one-year jail term upon conviction. He had beaten that rap. But the jury-tampering efforts there had resulted in an eight-year prison sentence. And this man, considered a "smart" fellow by his hoodlum associates. had still more trouble ahead in Chicago. ❑