What Were They Trying to Hide and How Did They Hide It
Lindauer's career as a US intelligence asset and back channel to Iraq first came to light in 1998. She released an affidavit for the Lockerbie bombing trial recounting information provided to her by the man she described as her CIA handler, Richard Fuisz. The claim was that the bombings were carried out by Syrian operatives, not the accused Libyans. Given Fuisz's reputed high level intelligence skills, this was a major event covered in the press. Despite the publicity and controversy surrounding the affidavit, Lindauer's association with Fuisz continued. She was never charged or even reprimanded by the government for her role in the affair.
But when Lindauer was willing to go public with her work on Iraq with Fuisz and another reported intelligence handler, Paul Hoven, she was indicted for giving one letter to Andrew Card, a letter which proved to be very much in line with of the best advice the Bush administration received on the ill conceived, deadly invasion and occupation of Iraq. That was what the administration was so intent on hide hiding.
The information Lindauer would have released, as told in Extreme Prejudice, concerned her work with Fuisz in the months prior to 9/11 in which Fuisz and his team provided early warning about the attacks on the World Trade Center. She would have revealed Iraq's willingness to turn over terrorists to the FBI and about her contact providing information on al Qaeda's financial structure and funding.
The vehicle to silence Lindauer was the indictment as an unregistered foreign agent, despite the flimsy basis for the charge. Once indicted, the newly crafted Patriot Act was the clincher. The act allows charges to be levied without specifics listed in an indictment or known to the defendant. In fact, under the act, the defendant's attorney may not have access to the charges unless certain security requirements are met.
In Lindauer's case, her attorney had a secret briefing with US intelligence officials. Just as the Patriot Act allows, the occurrence and the content of that meeting were never revealed to Lindauer. Her first attorney, Samuel Talkin, had a met with US intelligence officials shortly after the defense psychologist, Sanford L. Drob, PhD, conducted a two hour interview with Lindauer (report reviewed by the author).. A few days after the Talkin-US intelligence meeting, Drob recommended a defense based on mental incompetence. The meeting between her first attorney's and US intelligence officials was revealed to Lindauer only years later by her second counsel, Brian Shaughnessy, who obtained the information through pre trial discovery motions.
Psychiatric Set Up and Tear Down
The full spectrum tear down of Lindauer relied heavily on highly selective psychiatric testimony from several court appointed psychiatrists in Manhattan. None of these psychiatrists ever treated Lindauer. They all interviewed her in a forensic setting, which typically drastically limits understanding an examinee's mental state in politically charged contexts where the examinee is not cooperative. Worse, the forensic experts hired by the state in such contexts often act as "hired guns," and typically refuse to consider independent substantive evidence that supports the examinee's claims.
By her report and the author's review of interview transcripts provided by her attorney, Lindauer was not once cooperative with the court appointed forensic examiners. The dialog between her and psychiatrist Stewart Kleinman, MD, the most influential expert, was caustic and devoid of substantive content. Linder repeatedly stated that she didn't want to be interviewed by Kleinman.
In essence, the court experts routinely refused to follow up with witnesses Lindauer offered to attest to her role as an intelligence asset and to confirm her activities related to Iraq.
Most telling, the experts, upon whom Judge Mukasey relied for his confinement of Lindauer and his later opinion on forced medication, failed to consider the twelve month record of evaluation and counseling treatment after her arrest. Psychiatrist Dr John S. Kennedy, MD of Maryland concluded that her:
-- thought content was free of hallucinations, delusions, homicidality, or suicidality. She expressed confidence in an acquittal. Judgment and insight were fair. Cognition was grossly intact. " I don not believe there are grounds for a psychosis diagnosis." March 13, 2004
Lindauer attended 35 hours of counseling sessions between March 2004 and April 2005. You can examine the notes yourself provided by Lindauer and a part of her legal defense documentation.
There is a consistent pattern of assessed psychological stability in every single monthly summary. A frequent theme is expressed over time is that Lindauer, "appears to maintain psychological stability and shows no sign or symptom of mania or psychosis." Her treatment was concluded on April 7, 2005 with the note, "So far she has shown no signs of mania or depression and any symptoms of psychosis that would require additional intervention."
This information was not seriously considered or, more likely, completely ignored by the New York court appointed "experts" who labeled her delusional for maintaining her innocence. In addition, never mentioned in court proceedings was important evidence from Carswell psychiatric nursing reports. These reports document a consistent pattern of positive behavior and no signs of hallucinations or delusions during confinement. The Mukasey ruling of September 6, 2006, well referenced with the court expert opinions, makes no mention of Dr. Kennedy's evaluation, the 35 hours of counseling provided in Maryland, or the Carswell nursing reports. This was highly relevant primary evidence by clinicians familiar with Lindauer's day to day and week to week behavior over time.
As she tells it convincingly in Extreme Prejudice, Lindauer had to be silenced. First she was defamed publicly as someone who had worked for Iraq. Then she was diminished by the selective analysis by court appointed psychiatrists which further negated her story. Like the current Wikileaks controversy over Julian Assange, the delivery of bad news for those in power in the White House resulted in a figurative order to shoot the messenger.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
6
5
4
