Why the last of the JFK files could embarrass the CIA [View all]

[undeterred]

Among the 40,000 documents are roughly 3,600 that have never been seen by the public.
By BRYAN BENDER 25/5/15, 7:00 PM CET Updated 25/5/15, 7:00 PM CET

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — Shortly after the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Chief Justice Earl Warren, who oversaw the first official inquiry, was asked by a reporter if the full record would be made public. “Yes, there will come a time,” the chairman of the Warren Commission responded. “But it might not be in your lifetime.” It will soon be in ours — that is, unless the CIA, FBI or other agencies still holding on to thousands of secret documents from a series of related probes convince the next occupant of the White House otherwise.

A special team of seven archivists and technicians with top-secret security clearances has been set up at the National Archives and Records Administration to process all or portions of 40,000 documents that constitute the final collection of known federal records that might shed light on the events surrounding JFK’s murder, POLITICO has learned — files that according to law must be made public by October 2017.

But the records’ release is not guaranteed, says Martha Murphy, head of the National Archives’ Special Access Branch. While the JFK Records Act of 1992 mandated the files be made public in 25 years, government agencies that created the paper trail can still appeal directly to the president to keep them hidden. And some scholars and researchers, not to mention the army of JFK conspiracy theorists, fear that is exactly what will happen given the details about the deepest, darkest corners of American spy craft that could be revealed — from the inner workings of the CIA’s foreign assassination program and front companies to the role of a CIA psychological operations guru accused of misleading congressional investigators about alleged assassin Lee Harvey Oswald’s activities.

“We have sent letters to agencies letting them know we have records here that were withheld, 2017 is coming,” Murphy said in a recent interview at the primary government records repository in the D.C. suburbs. She said while no agency has formally requested a waiver yet, some “have gotten back to ask for clarification” and are seeking “more information.” “Within our power, the National Archives is going to do everything we can to make these records open and available to the public,” she added. “And that is my only goal. There are limits to my powers and the president of the United States has the right to say something needs to be held for longer.”



Read more: http://www.politico.eu/article/why-the-last-of-the-jfk-files-could-embarrass-the-cia/