Posted on 07/09/2003 4:04:00 PM PDT by Doug Thompson
Damn, I hate it when I've been had and I've been had big time.
In 1982, while I was working for Congressman Manuel Lujan of New Mexico, a man came up to a me during a gathering in Albuquerque and introduced himself as Terrance J. Wilkinson. He said he was a security consultant and gave me a business card with his name and just a Los Angeles phone number.
A few weeks later, he called my Washington office and asked to meet for lunch. He seemed to know a lot about the nuclear labs in New Mexico and said he had conducted "security profiles" for both Los Alamos and Sandia National Labs. Lujan served on the committee with oversight on both labs and he offered his services if we ever needed briefings.
We already had nuclear experts on the committee, on loan from the Department of Energy, and we never used Wilkinson for briefings but we kept in touch over the years. He said he had served in Vietnam with Army Special Force, worked for Air America, later for the FBI and as a consultant for the CIA. He said he had helped other Republican members of Congress I called some friends in other GOP offices and they said yes, they knew Terry Wilkinson.
"You can trust him, he's one of the good guys," one chief of staff told me. When I left politics and returned to journalism, Wilkinson became a willing, but always unnamed, source.
Over the last couple of years, Wilkinson served as either a primary or secondary source on a number of stories that have appeared in Capitol Hill Blue regarding intelligence activities. In early stories, I collaborated his information with at least one more source. His information usually proved accurate and, over time, I came to depend on him as a source without additional backup.
On Tuesday, we ran a story headlined "White House admits Bush wrong about Iraqi nukes." For the first time, Wilkinsson said he was willing to go on the record and told a story about being present, as a CIA contract consultant, at two briefings with Bush. He said he was retired now and was fed up and wanted to go public.
"He (Bush) said that if the current operatives working for the CIA couldn't prove the story was true, then the agency had better find some who could," Wilkinson said in our story. "He said he knew the story was true and so would the world after American troops secured the country."
After the story ran, we received a number of emails or phone calls that (1) either claimed Wilkinson was lying or (2) doubted his existence. I quickly dismissed the claims. After all, I had known this guy for 20+ years and had no doubt about his credibility. Some people wanted to talk to him, so I forwarded those requests on to him via email. He didn't answer my emails, which I found odd. I should have listened to a bell that should have been going off in my ear.
Today, a White House source I know and trust said visitor logs don't have any record of anyone named Terrance J. Wilkinson ever being present at a meeting with the President. Then a CIA source I trust said the agency had no record of a contract consultant with that name. "Nobody, and I mean nobody, has ever heard of this guy," my source said.
I tried calling Terry's phone number. I got a recorded message from a wireless phone provider saying the number was no longer in service. I tried a second phone number I had for him. Same result.
Then a friend from the Hill called.
"You've been had," she said. "I know about this guy. He's been around for years, claiming to have been in Special Forces, with the CIA, with NSA. He hasn't worked for any of them and his name is not Terrance Wilkinson."
Both of his phone numbers have Los Angeles area codes but an identity check through Know-X today revealed no record of anyone named Terrance J. Wilkinson ever having lived in LA or surrounding communities.
His email address turns out to be a blind forward to a free email service where anyone can sign up and get an email account. Because it was not one of the usual "free" services like Hotmail, Yahoo or such, I did not recognize it as one (although you'd think that someone like me would have known better).
The bottom line is that someone has been running a con on me for 20 some years and I fell for it like a little old lady in a pigeon drop scheme. I've spent the last two hours going through the database of Capitol Hill Blue stories and removing any that were based on information from Wilkinson (or whoever he is). I've also removed his name, quotes and claims from Tuesday's story about the White House and the uranium claims.
Erasing the stories doesn't erase the fact that we ran articles containing informattion that, given the source, were most likely inaccurate. And it doesn't erase the sad fact that my own arrogance allowed me to be conned.
It will be a long time (and perhaps never) before I trust someone else who comes forward and offers inside information. The next one who does had better be prepared to produce a birth certificate, a driver's license and his grandmother's maiden name.
Any news publication exists on the trust of its readers. Because I depended on a source that was not credible, I violated the trust that the readers of Capitol Hill Blue placed in me.
I was wrong. I am sorry.
© Copyright 2003 by Capitol Hill Blue
Doug, you should NOT remove the offending articles... they are part of your website's history and the history of this era. You cannot unring a bell. You can, however, provide the evidence that the bell is made of pot-metal and not authentic.
This story, fraudulent as it is, is now also part of history and the evidence of HOW it happened and how it was exposed should not be eliminated. In fact, William McKinley's thread on FR should be included.
To REMOVE the articles smacks more of cover-up and avoidance of responsibility. There are unknowable numbers of copies of the original articles now circulating around the internet... and many people will see them and believe them. By leaving the originals in place WITH the entire sordid story of fraud and reportorial gullability would at least allow those trying to track down the truth to have the ultimate source intact.
Retraction should be printed and prominently place in bold print at the TOP of each article ... but the erroneous stories should remain in place AS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED. The retraction should make it plain that you no longer place any conifidence in the accuracy fot he article and should contain the lack of provenance of the source and the mea culpas of the author.
We need to correct our mistakes... AND let them be examples... if we are to learn anything from them.
Posted by T.J. Wilkinson/Republic of Ethiopia on September 05, 1997 at 15:03:15:
In Reply to: Civil War in Afghanistan posted by Rep. of Korea on September 05, 1997 at 14:58:35:
:The situation in Afganistan certainly should be dicussed by this body; however, the delegate from the Republic of Korea's suggestion to send in peackeepers to "end" the civil war would not be appropriate at this time. It is interesting to note that the right honourable delegate from the Republic of Poland was recently censured for making this same suggestion about the situation in Korea earlier. Until Afganistian presents itself as a clear threat to the peace and security of the region, then no military action should be taken by the United Nations. Thank you.
Question is, is he related to this "guy," who - whether or not he exists - was quoted in a Newsweek article that has been used as a source for countless other articles, and credited with knowing all manner of intimate insider things before "resigning" or as some sites claim, "retiring?"
Well, I see The Guardian has a story now dated July 10 citing Thielmann and using the "L" word. I searched to see if it has been posted as its own thread here on FR but don't see it.
White House 'lied about Saddam threat'
Excerpt:
A former US intelligence official who served under the Bush administration in the build-up to the Iraq war accused the White House yesterday of lying about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein.
~snip~
This was the first time an administration official has put his name to specific claims. The whistleblower, Gregory Thielmann, served as a director in the state department's bureau of intelligence until his retirement in September, and had access to the classified reports which formed the basis for the US case against Saddam, spelled out by President Bush and his aides.
Mr Thielmannn said yesterday: "I believe the Bush administration did not provide an accurate picture to the American people of the military threat posed by Iraq."
Mr Thielmann also said there was no significant pattern of cooperation between Iraq and al-Qaida.
Interesting that even Thielmann doesn't say there was *no* connection or cooperation---patterned or otherwise.
Most likely the proverbial "'Rat's Ash" that no one gives...
Last night I posted the results of my Google search on William McKinley's original thread. See what I found on a Terrence J. Wilkinson here: even though Doug Thompson now says the name is a fake
Marking to resume reading tomorrow. This I don't want to get buried.
Most interesting.
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