U.S. Concedes That Maybe FBI Should Have Fired Miller

A federal prosecutor conceded Thursday that the FBI possibly should have fired Richard W. Miller because he was a “misfit” as an agent, but told jurors in Miller’s spy trial that the issue is not a proper one for them to consider in weighing the former agent’s guilt or innocence.

“Maybe he shouldn’t have been retained. At best, Mr. Miller was a mediocre agent. I would suggest he was a misfit,” said U.S. Atty. Robert C. Bonner. “The FBI perhaps didn’t move as swiftly and as surely as they might have in the beauty of 20-20 hindsight.”

Bonner, the first government official to directly address the issue of whether Miller should have been fired by the FBI, made his comments about Miller’s dismal 20-year FBI career at the end of closing arguments in Miller’s espionage case.

Not an Issue

“It’s only natural to ask that question, but it is not an issue for you as jurors to decide,” Bonner said. “You can’t just go out and say you’re fired. That’s not the way it works in government or the FBI. Maybe that’s the way it should work.”

Bonner’s remarks came in response to closing arguments from defense lawyer Joel Levine, who asked jurors Wednesday to think about why the FBI had kept Miller in a counterintelligence job when it was known he had personal problems that made him a “classic target” for recruitment by the Soviet KGB.

“Certain agents of the FBI knew certain things,” Bonner said. “The FBI in September, 1983, did take him off his regular cases and assign him to listening to wiretaps in the FBI tech room. Maybe, in hindsight, that exacerbated the problem.”

While some of Miller’s FBI superiors knew that he had been excommunicated from the Mormon Church and was facing possible dismissal for a chronic weight problem, Bonner insisted that the FBI had no idea of the full extent of Miller’s personal problems.

“There’s no question the FBI was not aware of the severity of his financial problems. The FBI did not know about his previous sale of FBI information to Larry Grayson,” Bonner said.

“You just can’t have a situation where a disgruntled FBI or CIA agent can come in here and say his agency should have fired him. If that’s a defense, ladies and gentlement, God help us all,” Bonner added.

In his final remarks, Bonner also took issue with a statement made Aug. 6 during opening defense comments that compared Miller to Ralph Kramden, the bumbling bus driver character portrayed by Jackie Gleason on television’s “The Honeymooners.”

“The only comparison of Mr. Miller to Ralph Kramden is that they were both overweight,” Bonner said. “Ralph Kramden wasn’t disloyal to his wife, wasn’t disloyal to his country. We’re not talking about Ralph Kramden. Let’s talk about who Miller was.”

Bonner, referring to previous alleged bribe-taking by Miller, said Miller was “not a person who rejected the idea of doing something illegal for money.” He added that Miller’s asking price for selling FBI documents to the Soviet Union was $50,000 in gold.

Claims Ridiculed

Ridiculing Miller’s claims that he was involved with Svetlana Ogorodnikova during the summer of 1984 in an attempt to infiltrate a Soviet spy ring and save his foundering career, Bonner pointed out that Miller had taken no notes of his meetings with the convicted Russian spy before reporting his involvement to FBI superiors Sept. 27, 1984.

“When Mr. Miller first gave that story that he was out to salvage his career it was baloney and it’s still baloney,” Bonner said. “This was a man who was willing to and did sell out the FBI. He was targeted by the KGB for good reason. Miller was not just morally weak, he was already corrupt.”

For the second straight day, defense lawyers asked U.S. District Judge David V. Kenyon to declare a mistrial in the case because of Bonner’s comments, but the judge refused. Kenyon said he will deliver jury instructions today and submit the case to the jury.