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Liddy Letter
VICTORY HOW SWEET IT IS

On February 1, 2001, a Baltimore jury ruled 8-1 in favor of G. Gordon Liddy over John Dean’s surrogate, Ida "Maxie" Wells. Shortly thereafter, Chief Judge Motz gave the judgement "as a matter of law," specifically stating that "no reasonable jury could find that G. Gordon Liddy was negligent" in making the statements he made about Watergate. John W. Dean, III, former Counsel to President Nixon, who turned government informant against his client, the President, and his White House colleagues, in order to receive preferential treatment, started the litigation by suing Liddy in 1992 for defamation. When it came time for Liddy to go to trial, Dean, a.k.a. "the weasel," was nowhere to be found. Dean dropped the case at the eleventh hour to avoid having to take the stand and face Liddy.

Prior to the trial date, Dean attempted to learn how much Liddy’s lawyers, investigators, and Liddy, himself, had uncovered about the call-girl ring at the Columbia Plaza Apartments next door to the Water-gate Headquarters of the Democratic National Committee. He did so by illegally taping a speech Liddy delivered at James Madison University in 1996. Liddy gave a speech that had nothing to do with Watergate, but at the end of all his speeches, he makes it a practice to entertain questions. He answers whatever questions are asked. The only rule is that there are no rules.

One of the questioners asked Liddy about Watergate, specifically about "one of the theories surrounding the mystery of Watergate." Liddy answered the question as he always does, describing how it was John Dean who hired him to develop and oversee an all-out offensive and defensive political intelligence gathering operation for the Republicans to use during the 1972 General Election. He also stated that he had never planned an entry into the Watergate headquarters of the DNC, but that one day Magruder called him. It was clear to Liddy that Magruder was under orders from someone else because Magruder was not anyone to originate anything like this. Magruder told Liddy that he had to get into the Watergate.

At James Madison University, Liddy recounted his conversation with Jeb Magruder. Liddy told Magruder, "Yeah, well we can get into the Watergate, but we haven’t planned to do so because nobody’s there now. There’s nothing happening there now and we have not budgeted for it." Magruder told Liddy that he had to go in there anyway. Liddy instructed the Cuban break-in team to go into the Watergate and place a bug in Larry O’Brien’s office, but that is not what happened. There was never any bug found in there, and the lookout post could not hear direct line FM communications from Larry O’Brien’s office. The lookout looked directly down at the desk of a secretary, named Maxine Wells, and her telephone. And, Liddy said, "the [lookout] had a telescopic lens camera pointed at that. And that is where the wiretap was subsequently found by the Democrats on that phone."

"Now, why was there a wiretap there?" Liddy asked the audience at James Madison. "And, why did they go back in?"
This is a question of historical importance to all Americans. Richard Nixon was forced to resign the Office of President of the United States because of Watergate, more specifically, the cover-up of Watergate. But what was the purpose of the June 17, 1972 Watergate break-in? Nobody has ever really known. Thus, there was never any indictment of whomever ordered the Watergate break-in. Jeb Magruder said that it was Mitchell. Mitchell denied it in 1972 and continued to deny it until he died. Magruder was not a credible witness. He had conspired with John Dean to perjure himself before the grand jury. Many historians doubt Mitchell ordered the break-in because he had no motive. There was no political intelligence of any value in Chairman Larry O’Brien’s office at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Water-gate. That is why Liddy never scheduled a break-in there in the first place. Perhaps, political intelligence was not the objective of the break-in.

In the late 1980’s, Liddy learned about a lawyer for a Washington D.C. call-girl ring, Phillip Makin Bailley. Bailley was arrested for his involvement in prostitution in June 1972. The FBI had raided Bailley’s home and office. During the raid, the FBI seized numerous address books with names of call girls and johns. According to Assistant U.S. Attorney John Rudy, one of the books had the code name "CLOUT." Rudy has testified that his office had determined that CLOUT had the initials M.B. Thus, she was referred to as "Mike Bravo." Bailley’s secretary Jeanine testified that "CLOUT" was Maureen Biner, John Dean’s future wife.

There was a lot of publicity about Bailley’s arrest in the early summer of 1972. A newspaper article mentioned that a White House lawyer was listed in one of Bailley’s seized address books. The very next business day after that article appeared in the Washington newspaper, June 12, 1972, Liddy received orders to have the break-in team go back into the Watergate.

Liddy told the audience at James Madison about Bailley. He said, "Here’s what happened, and part of this I learned from a lawyer who represented a group of women who were running a call-girl operation across the street from the Watergate in a place called the Columbia Plaza Apartments. The name of the madam was Heidi Rikan. She used to call herself, sometimes, Cathy Deiter. And, according to the lawyer, the girls that were being used there came from two venues.Some were veterans of the Xaviera Hollander ‘Happy Hooker’ operation up on East Fifty-Fifth Street in New York City. And the others were what they called the ‘Hollywood’ or the ‘California Girls.’ Well, to make a long story short, the lawyer was arrested and they got his books that had his clients, ... all there listed, and all these girls. And code names. And one of the code names was for a girl named ‘Mo.’ Code name was ‘CLOUT.’ And according to the lawyer, she received that nickname. . . from one of the New York girls. CLOUT was a California girl, [the lawyer] told me. And he said that one Marian Taylor, one of the New York girls, thought that CLOUT was putting on airs and thought that she was better than the rest of the girls because she was then the paramour of the Counsel to the President of the United States, John Dean."

Liddy also told the audience that one of the Watergate burglars, Eugenio Martinez, had been arrested with a key. The FBI took the key from the D.C. police and tested it on all the locks in the DNC headquarters. The FBI determined that the key taken from Martinez fit the desk of Ida "Maxie" Wells.

John Dean had his lawyer illegally tape record the James Madison lecture. He sent portions of the transcript to Ms. Wells and urged her to sue Liddy. Wells was understandably reluctant to sue Liddy, but Dean left her with the false impression that Liddy was traveling the country giving lectures about her to college campuses. In fact, Liddy was not giving lectures about Maxie Wells. There would be no market for such a lecture, and Liddy would have no interest in giving one. But Liddy did deliver a lecture, mostly to corporate clients, entitled Survive versus Prevail. It had nothing to do with Watergate. Dean’s representations to Maxie Wells about Liddy’s lecture were about as accurate as his testimony to the Senate Watergate Committee about Watergate.

Thus, Dean persuaded the poor woman to sue. Ms. Wells retained Dean’s lawyer, David Dorsen, to represent her in Court. Dorsen was the lawyer who illegally tape recorded Liddy’s lecture at James Madison. Dean ran away when his trial date approached, but the Wells case went to trial in Baltimore, Maryland.

At trial there was a mountain of evidence proving the call-girl theory correct. Some of the evidence is as follows:

The key found on the burglar, Eugenio Martinez, fit the desk of Ida "Maxie" Wells, which was in the R. Spencer Oliver/ Wells section of the office, nowhere near Larry O’Brien’s office. The conventional theory of Watergate is that the burglars’ target was O’Brien’s office.
The FBI told Maxie Wells that the key found on the burglars fit her desk. She shrieked, "Oh my God. . . they didn’t get in there!" when she realized that the burglars might have been targeting her desk or filing cabinet.
When questioned by the Senate Watergate Committee about why she believed the burglars were targeting her desk, she withheld the information the FBI told her about Martinez being caught with the key.
There was never any bug found in O’Brien’s office or phone.
The bugs used by the burglars transmitted on an FM frequency, which required line of sight to the eavesdropping post at the Howard Johnson’s. O’Briens’ office or phone could never be picked up from the Howard Johnson’s. The Oliver/Wells office was directly across the street and under constant surveillance from CRP lookout, Alfred Baldwin.
Alfred Baldwin testified that he repeatedly overheard conversations of R. Spencer Oliver and Maxie Wells.
Wells testified that she often used the Oliver phone.
Baldwin testified that he heard many phone conversations specifically assigning partners for dates, including dates for dinner with discussion of specific sex acts that would follow dinner. He said prosecutors would not have heard enough to indict for prostitution, but that eight out of ten laymen who overheard the phone calls from the Oliver/Wells phone in the DNC would conclude that there was a prostitution ring facilitated from that phone.
After the Watergate break-in, Wells left the DNC. She visited a friend in Boulder, Colorado, named Joanne. While there, Wells learned that the FBI would subpoena her. Right after leaving Colorado, Wells wrote Joanne a letter in which she stated that she feared the FBI would investigate her activities while she was employed at the DNC, and that if they did they would find the making of "a real moral scandal." She instructed Joanne to destroy the letter after she read it.
A former DNC receptionist told the FBI that she believed Wells was dating a man named Bailley.
Phillip Makin Bailley, the attorney for the call-girl ring, stated that he had a contact in the DNC that helped him facilitate the call-girl assignations.
Philip Makin Bailley said that he dated Maxie Wells.
When under oath, Wells refused to state that she never dated Bailley, only that she dated a lot of people and could not remember.
Bailley’s secretary stated that Wells called Bailley at least 25 times after Christmas 1972 and before June 1972 and that Maureen Biner also called several firms.
Several former DNC employees testified that at the time Oliver was fired, immediately after the break-in, there was a rumor that he was fired for involvement in a prostitution ring.
Assistant U.S. Attorney John Rudy stated that he had evidence link-ing Wells’ boss, Oliver, to the Columbia Plaza call-girl ring.
Assistant U.S. Attorney John Rudy stated that his investigation had uncovered a lead that there was a link between the Columbia Plaza call-girl ring and the DNC, but that his superiors ordered him to put his investigation into the DNC link "on ice" because it would be politically explosive.
Wells stated that the only reason she locked her desk was to protect her office supplies and hand lotion from theft. Another DNC employee at the DNC at the time said that was ridiculous.
Wells wrote in the letter to her friend and confidante Joanne that there were personal documents in the desk that she hoped the FBI would not learn about.
The FBI traced a name in Bailley’s address book to "a secretary of an Administrative Assistant" in the DNC.
Lou Russell, a bouncer for the call-girl ring, was present outside the Watergate the night of the June 17, 1972, break-in.
Lou Russell tapped the phones at the Columbia Plaza call-girl ring and stated that he overheard several conversations between the call-girl operation and the DNC.
Circumstantial evidence links money John Dean took from the White House safe containing excess 1968 campaign cash to two payoffs to Lou Russell: 1. November, 1972, $4,350 2. March, 1973, $21,000 Dean was never able to satisfactorily account for the money he took from the 1968 fund. Prior to testifying about it, he asked Fred LaRue for a receipt for $350,000. LaRue refused, stating that he only gave Dean $328,000. Dean said that he needed some of it for his honeymoon, but he could never account for all of it.

Liddy’s victory in court is also a victory for all Americans. Liddy said, "My victory over Dean is a great victory for the people of this country under its re-affirmation of the primacy of the First Amendment." It means that we are all free to study the prior testimony of all those involved in Watergate, the FBI records and the prosecutor’s notes from the Archives, the sworn testimony in this and the Dean v. St. Martins Press litigation, as well as other evidence. We are free to draw our own conclusions about Watergate-an important part of our twentieth century American political history-without fear of censorship from those who want to conceal the facts and force Americans to accept nothing about Watergate except that placed into the record by Dean’s perjury and the sloppy reporting of the Washington BLEEP.

This litigation was started by Dean. With his victory, Liddy has driven a stake through Dean’s heart. In the words of the G-man, "How sweet it is!"