Larry W. Bryant’s UFOview

Were he alive today, court chronicler Charles Dickens probably couldn't help chuckling over how the U. S. Central Intelligence Agency remains unable to resist playing games with certain FOIA requesters. In my own case of Bryant v. Central Intelligence Agency (filed on May 20, 2009, in U. S. District Court for the District of Columbia), the latest gamesmanship exudes from the hand of CIA FOIA official Delores M. Nelson, who, in late-2008, refused to honor my FOIA requester status as a "representative of the news media" and to conduct the requested records search. Her Oct. 21, 2009, letter to me (quoted below) sets the stage for my eventual legal victory (to include full reimbursement of my attorney's fees).

== TEXT OF MS. NELSON'S 21 OCT 09 LETTER TO LWB ==

Reference: F-2008-01781

Dear Mr. Bryant:

This is a final response to your 23 August 2008 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, and subsequent litigation, for the following CIA-received and CIA-generated records:

(1) As pertain to the convening, attendance roster, briefings, minutes, and all other related documentation of the 1987 special meeting at FAA headquarters in Washington, D.C.;

(2) As pertain to all other similar cases of airborne UFO encounters reportedly occurring since November 17, 1986, to date.

We processed your request in accordance with the FOIA, 5 U.S.C. Section 552, as amended, and the CIA Information Act, 50 U.S.C. Section 431, as amended. Our processing included a search for records as described in our 23 June 2009 letter existing through the date of 15 June 2009.

No records responsive to item 1 were located. With respect to item 2, we have located United States Government material that was not originated by CIA. This material appears to be relevant to your request and has been referred to its originating agency for review and direct response to you. Please note that the CIA regulations governing administrative appeals provide that no appeal shall be accepted if the information in question is the subject of a pending litigation in the federal courts.

Sincerely,

Delores M. Nelson
Information and Privacy Coordinator
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LWB Note: In adhering to the CIA culture of secrecy for secrecy's sake, Nelson's insistence on not identifying the "originating agency" that surfaced during her records search amounts to a needless cat-and-mouse game (at taxpayer expense, of course).

Moving to the legislative side of CIA gamesmanship, we have the below-quoted 29 Oct 09 response to my letter of June 30, 2009, to Virginia Sen. Jim Webb (a member of the U. S. Senate Committees on Armed Services and on Foreign Relations). Webb's public service, by the way, includes a tour as secretary of the Navy (and many of us accept the fact that the Navy department long has had the lion's share of managing the official U. S. cover-up of the UFO-E.T. experience).

== TEXT OF SEN. WEBB'S 29 OCT 09 LETTER TO LWB ==

Dear Mr. Bryant:

I have received the enclosed correspondence from the CIA in response to my inquiry on your behalf.

Again, thank you for writing. As your Senator, I hope that you will contact me anytime you feel that I may be of assistance to you with any problem of a federal nature. Please contact my Northern Virginia Office, at 7309 Arlington Boulevard, Suite 316, Falls Church, VA 22042.

With warm regards, I remain

Sincerely,

Jim Webb
United States Senator
JW:gs
Enclosure

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LWB Note: Webb's enclosure consists of a printed-out e-mail message of Oct. 28, 2009, from a CIA employee identified by his e-address (timothrr@ucia.gov); it's addressed to Webb staffer Gwen Sigda and contains the following non-commitment:

"Good Afternoon Gwen,

"Per our conversation, this email is in response to your letter dated 15 July 2009, regarding your constituent, Mr. Larry Bryant. My office has forwarded Mr. Bryant's correspondence to the appropriate internal office, who will consider it given this and past correspondence from Mr. Bryant. I unfortunately can't make any guarantees what will happen with Mr. Bryant's request from here, but I wanted to let you know that we have forwarded it to the appropriate office for review.

"I hope this information is helpful in responding to your constituent. Please feel free to let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

"Thanks,
"Tim"

Can we presume that Tim's reference to the "appropriate internal office" means the CIA inspector general's office? -- the very office that, to date, continues to ignore my May 30, 2009, request that it investigate the CIA mistreatment of former FAA official John J. Callahan back in 1987. This gamesmanship poses the question of who's investigating the investigators here --- shouldn't it be the U. S. Senate?

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LAWSUIT Update: In late October 2009, the assistant U. S. attorney defending the CIA in Bryant v. Central Intelligence Agency succeeded in gaining from the judge an additional enlargement of time in order to file an answer (or otherwise respond) to my complaint. Now the court's deadline for the Justice Department's response is set for January 11, 2010. Stay tuned.

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