WATERGATE CONSPIRATOR

—— Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 20100801 1: CIA-RDP90-00845R000201140011-8 UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL 1983 27 June 1983 By WILLIAM COTTERELL ATLANTA Hunt An attorney for Watergate conspirator E. Howard Hunt told a federal court Yonday that Hunt was maliciously libeled by a conservative organization that linked him to the murder of President Kennedy. An attorney for the Liberty Lobby, a Washington-based group that published a 1978 article about Hunt's past Central Intelligence Agency activities, said Hunt had failed to prove the author or editors of the report knew he Kas not in Dallas Nav. 22, 1963 —= the day Kennedy was fatally snot. i The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals spent an hour in oral arguments of the Liberty Lobby's appeal, but gave no indication when it might resolve the case. Hunt was awarded $650,000 by a Miami jury that found the Liverty Lobby responsible for an article in its weekly tabloid, The Spotlight, Which said the Cla_was ready to name Hunt as a conspirator in the Kennedy murder. He nag sued for 3.5 million. The article by former CIA agent Victor Marchetti said the agency was angry with Hunt because he tried to involve the CIA in the Watergate coverup. Farchetti was not a defendant in the suit. Hunt, Who served 32 months in prison for his part in the Watergate conspiracy, was a former CIA agent and author of mystery novels. Despite the Marchetti article's allegations, no Cla testimony before the House Select Committee on Assassinations in 1978 ever linked Hunt to tne Kennedy | assassination. "This was a case of, 'Who cares whether it's true or not, let's publish it anyuay -- it's sensational,’ said Willian Snyder, a Baltinore attorney representing Hunt, 'The article was not hot news. Hr. Marchetti is widely thougnt to be a CIA renegade ike Philip Agee of Frank Snepp, who sakes a career out of fingering (IA agents.'' Styder said the Liberty Lobby could easily have ascertained Marchetti's reliability, noting that he was once enjoined by a federal court in Alexandria, Va. fron publishing information about the CIA. REIN ‘Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/11 : CIA-RDP90-00845R000201140011-8