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<\/a><\/p>\nAppalling for both the villainous abuse of children itself and the chilling implications of government by blackmail, this tangled web of unsavory alliances casts a lurid light on the political history of the U.S. from the Prohibition Era right up through the Age of Trump.<\/p>\n
by\u00a0Whitney Webb
\nMint Press News<\/p>\n
J<\/span>effrey Epstein, the billionaire who now sits in jail on federal charges for the sex trafficking of minors, has continued to draw media scrutiny in the weeks after his arrest on July 6. Part of the reason for this continued media interest is related to Epstein\u2019s alleged relationship to the intelligence services and new information about the true extent of the sexual blackmail operation Epstein is believed to have run for decades.<\/p>\n As\u00a0MintPress<\/i>\u00a0reported<\/a>\u00a0last week, Epstein was able to run this sordid operation for so long precisely because his was only the latest incarnation of a much older, more extensive operation that began in the 1950s and perhaps even earlier.<\/p>\n Starting first with mob-linked liquor baron Lewis Rosenstiel and later with Roy Cohn, Rosenstiel\u2019s protege and future mentor to Donald Trump, Epstein\u2019s is just one of the many sexual blackmail operations involving children that are all tied to the same network, which includes elements of organized crime, powerful Washington politicians, lobbyists and \u201cfixers,\u201d and clear links to intelligence as well as the FBI.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This report, Part II of this series titled \u201cThe Jeffrey Epstein Scandal: Too Big To Fail,\u201d will delve into Cohn\u2019s close ties to the Reagan administration, which was also closely tied to the same organized crime network led by the infamous mob figure Meyer Lansky, which was discussed in Part I<\/a>. Of particular importance is the \u201cIran Contra\u201d network, a group of Reagan officials and associates who played key roles in the Iran Contra scandal. Though it has remained relatively unknown for years, many key figures in that same network, and several fronts for the CIA that were involved in funneling money to the Central American Contra paramilitaries, were also trafficking minors for their sexual exploitation and use in sexual blackmail rings.<\/p>\n Several of these rings made headlines at one point or another over the years \u2014 from the \u201ccall boy ring\u201d run by Washington lobbyist Craig Spence, to the Franklin child-sex and murder ring run by Republican operative Larry King, to the scandal that enveloped the Catholic charity Covenant House in the late 1980s.<\/p>\n Yet, as this report will show, all of these rings \u2014 and more \u2014 were connected to the same network that involved key figures linked to the Reagan White House and linked to Roy Cohn \u2014 revealing the true scope of the sordid sexual blackmail operations and sex rings that involved the trafficking of children within the U.S. and even in Central America for their exploitation by dangerous and powerful pedophiles in the United States.<\/p>\n Appalling for both the villainous abuse of children itself and the chilling implications of government by blackmail, this tangled web of unsavory alliances casts a lurid light on the political history of the United States from the Prohibition Era right up to the present day and the Age of Trump, a fact made increasingly clear as more and more information comes to light in relation to the Jeffrey Epstein case.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Since Donald Trump burst onto the political scene in 2015, the legacy of his mentor, Roy Cohn \u2013 as well as Cohn\u2019s influence on his most famous protege \u2014 have begun to garner renewed media attention. Many of the profiles on Cohn following Trump\u2019s rise have focused solely on certain shadowy aspects of Cohn\u2019s history,particularly his association<\/a>\u00a0with\u00a0major figures in New York organized crime<\/a>, his corrupt dealings, and his eventual disbarment. Some of these portrayals even went so far as\u00a0to label<\/a>\u00a0Cohn as politically impotent. While Cohn was known to deal with a sizable amount of sleaze in his career, such depictions of the man fail to note that he had created an influence machine of unrivaled power that included some of the most prominent people in media and politics as well as a cadre of celebrities.<\/p>\n Cohn was closely associated with numerous celebrities, famous politicians and political operatives. Many of his birthday parties over the years\u00a0attracted<\/a>\u00a0such famous figures such as artist Andy Warhol, fashion designer Calvin Klein, and comedian Joey Adams, as well as\u00a0notable political figures<\/a>\u00a0including former Mayor of New York Abraham Beame and then-Assemblyman from Brooklyn and future Senator Chuck Schumer, among others. In 1979 Margaret Trudeau, mother of current Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau, attended Cohn\u2019s birthday party, where she\u00a0famously toppled<\/a>\u00a0his custom birthday cake; and of course Donald Trump, who became Cohn\u2019s protege in the mid-1970s, was a frequent fixture at social events held in Cohn\u2019s honor.<\/p>\n The politicians, journalists and celebrities invited to Cohn\u2019s exclusive parties were said to be those who \u201chad open accounts in Cohn\u2019s \u2018favor bank<\/a>,\u2019\u201d his nickname for his unofficial balance sheet of political favors and debts that was surely informed and influenced by his extensive involvement in sexual blackmail operations from the 1950s well into the 1980s.<\/p>\n Many of Cohn\u2019s celebrity friendships were cultivated through his relationship with and frequent appearances at the famous and famously debaucherous New York nightclub Studio 54, which was described by\u00a0Vanity Fair<\/i><\/a>\u00a0as \u201cthe giddy epicenter of 70s hedonism, a disco hothouse of beautiful people, endless cocaine, and every kind of sex.\u201d Cohn was the long-time lawyer of the club\u2019s owners, Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager.<\/p>\n Studio 54 co-owner Steve Rubell and Roy Cohn, left, talk to reporters outside U.S. District Court in Manhattan on, Nov. 2, 1979. Photo | AP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Among Cohn\u2019s closest friends were Barbara Walters, to whom Cohn\u00a0often referred<\/a>\u00a0as his \u201cfiancee\u201d in public, and whom he later introduced to the head of the U.S. Information Agency, Chad Wick, and other high rollers in the Reagan White House. Yet, Walters was just one of Cohn\u2019s powerful friends in the media, a group that\u00a0also included<\/a>\u00a0Abe Rosenthal, executive editor of the\u00a0New York Times<\/i>; William Safire, long-time\u00a0New York Times<\/i>\u00a0columnist and\u00a0New York Magazine<\/i>\u00a0contributor; and George Sokolsky of\u00a0The New York Herald Tribune<\/i>,\u00a0NBC\u00a0<\/i>and\u00a0ABC<\/i>. Sokolsky was a particularly close friend of both Cohn and former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, whose involvement in Cohn\u2019s sexual blackmail operation is described in Part I of this investigative series. Sokolsky ran the American Jewish League Against Communism with Cohn for several years and the organization later named its Medal of Honor after Sokolsky.<\/p>\n Cohn was also the attorney and friend of media mogul Rupert Murdoch and,\u00a0according to\u00a0New York Magazine<\/i><\/a>, \u201cWhenever Roy wanted a story stopped, item put in, or story exploited, Roy called Murdoch;\u201d and, after Murdoch bought\u00a0the New York Post<\/i>, Cohn \u201cwielded the paper as his personal shiv.\u201d\u00a0According to\u00a0the late journalist Robert Parry<\/a>, the friendship between Murdoch and Cohn first began thanks to their mutual support for Israel.<\/p>\n Cohn also leaned on his\u00a0life-long friend<\/a>\u00a0since high school, Si Newhouse Jr., to exert media influence. Newhouse oversaw the media empire that now includes\u00a0Vanity Fair, Vogue, GQ, The New Yorker,<\/i>\u00a0and numerous local newspapers throughout the United States, as well as major interests in cable television.\u00a0New York Magazine<\/i>\u00a0also noted<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cCohn used his influence in the early \u201980s to secure favors for himself and his Mob clients in Newhouse publications.\u201d In addition to Newhouse, Cohn\u2019s\u00a0other high school pals<\/a>, Generoso Pope Jr. and Richard Berlin, later became the owners of the\u00a0National Enquirer<\/i>\u00a0and the Hearst Corporation, respectively. Cohn was also a close friend of another media mogul, Mort Zuckerman, who \u2013 along with Rupert Murdoch \u2013 would go on to befriend Jeffrey Epstein.<\/p>\n Cohn\u2019s media confidants, like journalist William Buckley of\u00a0The National Review<\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0Firing Line,\u00a0<\/i>often attacked Cohn\u2019s political enemies \u2013 particularly long-time Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau \u2014 in their columns, using Cohn as an anonymous source. Buckley, whom historian George Nash\u00a0once called<\/a>\u00a0\u201cthe preeminent voice of American conservatism and its first great ecumenical figure,\u201d\u00a0received the George Sokolsky medal<\/a>\u00a0alongside Cohn\u2019s mob-linked client and \u201cSupreme Commander\u201d Lewis Rosenstiel from the Cohn-run American Jewish League Against Communism in 1966. Buckley later got a heavily discounted $65,000 loan to buy a luxury boat from a bank where Cohn held influence and whose president Cohn had hand picked, according to\u00a0a 1969 article<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0LIFE\u00a0<\/i>magazine.<\/p>\n Buckley \u2014 along with Barbara Walters, Alan Dershowitz and Donald Trump \u2014 would\u00a0later serve as character witnesses<\/a>\u00a0for Cohn during his 1986 disbarment hearings and all but Buckley would later draw controversy for their relationships with Jeffrey Epstein.<\/p>\n With connections like this, it\u2019s no wonder that Stanley Friedman \u2014 a law partner of Cohn, who was later imprisoned over\u00a0a kickback and bribery scandal<\/a>\u00a0while serving as New York\u2019s deputy mayor \u2014\u00a0told journalist Marie Brenner<\/a>\u00a0in 1980 that \u201cRoy could fix anyone in the city.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Roy Cohn\u2019s \u201cfavor bank\u201d and his unique position as a liaison between the criminal underworld, the rich and famous, and top media influencers made him a force to be reckoned with. Yet, it was his political connections to leadership figures in both the Republican and Democratic parties and his close relationship to long-time FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, among other figures, that made him and his dark secret \u201cuntouchable\u201d for much of his life. Though most of his political influence was forged in the 1950s, Cohn became\u00a0even<\/i>\u00a0more\u00a0<\/i>powerful with the rise of Ronald Reagan.<\/p>\n Even though he nominally maintained his affiliation with the Democratic Party throughout his life, Cohn was a well-known \u201cfixer\u201d for Republican candidates and this is clearly seen in his outsized roles during the 1976 and 1980 presidential campaigns of Ronald Reagan. It was during the latter that Cohn\u00a0would meet<\/a>another of his proteges, Roger Stone, whom he infamously instructed to leave\u00a0a hefty bribe<\/a>\u00a0tucked in a suitcase at the doorstep of the Liberal Party\u2019s headquarters during the 1980 campaign. During this campaign, Cohn would also meet Paul Manafort \u2014 an associate of Stone and later Trump\u2019s 2016 campaign manager \u2014 and introduce both to Donald Trump.<\/p>\n Cohn\u2019s law partner, Tom Bolan, was also an influential force in the Reagan campaign and\u00a0later chaired<\/a>\u00a0Reagan\u2019s transition team in 1980. Reagan\u00a0then named<\/a>Bolan, whom he considered a friend, a director of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, the government\u2019s development finance institution, and he was also\u00a0the New York finance co-chairman<\/a>\u00a0in the Reagan campaign in both 1980 and 1984. Bolan was\u00a0also close<\/a>\u00a0to others in Cohn\u2019s circle, such as William F. Buckley Jr., Donald Trump and Rupert Murdoch.<\/p>\n Furthermore, Bolan was instrumental in securing federal judgeships for several individuals who would later become influential,\u00a0including<\/a>\u00a0future FBI Director Louis Freeh. Cohn was also able to get friends of clients appointed as federal judges,\u00a0including<\/a>\u00a0Donald Trump\u2019s sister, Maryanne Trump Barry. After Barry was appointed as a federal judge, Trump\u00a0called<\/a>\u00a0Cohn to thank him for pulling strings on his sister\u2019s behalf.<\/p>\n Though Cohn was not given a public position in the Reagan administration, he was not merely a \u201cdirty trickster\u201d who worked in the shadows during the Reagan campaigns. In fact, he worked closely with some of the more visible faces of the campaign, including the then-communications director for Reagan\u2019s 1980 campaign and later CIA director, William Casey. According to\u00a0Christine Seymour<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 Cohn\u2019s long-time switchboard operator from the late 1960s up until his death in 1986, who listened in on his calls \u2014 Casey and Cohn were close friends and, during the 1980 campaign, Casey \u201ccalled Roy almost daily.\u201d<\/p>\n Seymour also noted that one of Cohn\u2019s other most frequent phone pals and closest friends was Nancy Reagan and she\u00a0was also one of his clients<\/a>. Reagan, whose influence over her husband was well-known, was so close to Cohn that it was largely his death from AIDS that\u00a0led her<\/a>\u00a0to \u201cencourage her husband to seek more funding for AIDS research.\u201d<\/p>\n Prior to Cohn\u2019s death, Nancy and her husband Ronald\u00a0secured his spot<\/a>\u00a0in an exclusive experimental AIDS treatment program, despite the Reagan administration\u2019s well-documented \u201cnon-response\u201d to the AIDS crisis of the era. Ronald Reagan was also a friend of Cohn\u2019s and, according to\u00a0late journalist Robert Parry<\/a>, \u201clavished favors on Cohn, including invitations to White House events, personal thank-you notes and friendly birthday wishes\u201d over the course of his presidency.<\/p>\n Given that Reagan heavily courted the evangelical right and promoted \u201cfamily values\u201d as president, the close ties between not only himself, but his inner circle, with Cohn may seem odd. However, Reagan, like Cohn, had deep ties to the same organized-crime factions that were among Cohn\u2019s clients and affiliates of the same Mafia figures close to Cohn\u2019s own mentor, Lewis Rosenstiel (see\u00a0Part I<\/a>).<\/p>\n Not unlike Cohn, Reagan\u2019s\u00a0own mentor<\/a>, Lew Wasserman, had close ties to the mob. Wasserman, the long-time president of MCA and the well-known Hollywood mogul, is known for not only making Reagan\u2019s film and television career, but also\u00a0supporting<\/a>\u00a0his successful push to become president of the Screen Actors Guild, which later launched Reagan\u2019s political career. In addition, MCA was a major financier of Reagan\u2019s successful gubernatorial bid in 1966 and, not long after Reagan became president, his administration\u00a0controversially shut down<\/a>\u00a0a massive Department of Justice (DOJ) probe into MCA\u2019s ties to organized crime.<\/p>\n Ronald Reagan, center, with A.C. Lyles and Lew Wasserman, right. Photo | A.C. Lyles<\/p>\n<\/div>\n According to Shawn Swords, a documentary filmmaker who explored Reagan\u2019s ties to MCA in\u00a0Wages of Spin II: Bring Down That Wall<\/i>:<\/p>\n Ronald Reagan was an opportunist. His whole career was guided by MCA \u2014 by Wasserman and [MCA founder] Jules Stein, who bragged that Reagan was malleable, that they could do what they wanted with him\u2026That thing about Reagan being tough on [organized] crime \u2014 that\u2019s a fallacy.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Swords\u2019 characterization of this relationship is\u00a0supported by<\/a>\u00a0an unnamed Hollywood source cited in a declassified DOJ document, who called Reagan \u201ca complete slave of MCA who would do their bidding on anything.\u201d<\/p>\n What elements of organized crime were connected to Wasserman? As a young man, Lew Wasserman joined the Mayfield Road Gang, which was run by Moe Dalitz, a close friend of Meyer Lansky who,\u00a0per the FBI<\/a>, was a powerful figure in Lansky\u2019s criminal enterprise, second only to Lansky himself among members of the Jewish mob.<\/p>\n Lew Wasserman would later marry Edith Beckerman, whose father\u00a0was Dalitz\u2019s lawyer<\/a>. Wasserman\u2019s\u00a0closest friend and lawyer<\/a>, Sidney Korshak, also had close ties to Dalitz and\u00a0once partnered<\/a>\u00a0with Lansky in the Acapulco Towers Hotel. Notably, the magazine\u00a0New West<\/i>\u00a0stated in 1976 that Korshak was the \u201clogical successor to Meyer Lansky.<\/a>\u201d Korshak, as a lawyer, fit a niche similar to Roy Cohn and\u00a0gained a reputation<\/a>\u00a0as the bridge between organized crime and respectable society.<\/p>\n In addition, the DOJ probe into MCA that the Reagan administration quashed was\u00a0reportedly spurred<\/a>\u00a0after the Justice Department learned that an influential member of the Gambino crime family, Salvatore Pisello, was doing business with the massive entertainment company. At that time, the boss of the Gambino crime family, Paul Castellano,\u00a0was a client<\/a>\u00a0of Roy Cohn.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Though Cohn\u2019s influence in the Reagan administration and his friendship with the Reagan family and their inner circle has been acknowledged, less well-known is how Cohn aided the CIA\u2019s covert propaganda efforts that were part of the larger scandal known as Iran-Contra.<\/p>\n Cohn, whose influence over the press has already been detailed, forged close ties with the director of the U.S. Information Agency, Chad Wick, even\u00a0hosting a luncheon<\/a>\u00a0in Wick\u2019s honor that was widely attended by influential figures in the conservative press, as well as senators and representatives. Soon after, then-CIA Director and Cohn friend William Casey was spearheading an extensive PR campaign aimed at shoring up public support for Reagan\u2019s Latin American policies, including support of the Contra paramilitaries.<\/p>\n This domestic propaganda effort was technically illegal and required that the CIA outsource the job to the private sector to minimize the risk of fall-out. As Robert Parry\u00a0reported<\/a>\u00a0in 2015, Wick took the lead in obtaining private funding for the effort and, just a few days after Wick promised to find private support, Cohn brought his close friend, the media mogul Rupert Murdoch, to the White House.<\/p>\n Reagan meets with Rupert Murdoch, U.S. Information Agency Director Charles Wick, and Roy Cohn in the Oval Office in 1983. Photo | Reagan presidential library<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Parry\u00a0later noted<\/a>\u00a0that, after this meeting, \u201cdocuments released during the Iran-Contra scandal in 1987 and later from the Reagan Library indicate that Murdoch was soon viewed as a source for the private funding\u201d for the propaganda campaign.<\/p>\n After that initial meeting, Murdoch became the top media ally of this Casey-directed propaganda effort, and also became increasingly close to the Reagan White House. Murdoch, as a consequence,\u00a0benefited greatly<\/a>\u00a0from Reagan\u2019s policies and his friendship with the administration, which allowed Murdoch to increase his U.S. media holdings and to create the Fox Broadcasting Corporation in 1987.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Roy Cohn was not the only one close to the Reagan administration who was simultaneously running sexual blackmail operations that abused and exploited children. In fact, there were several figures, all of whom shared direct connections to CIA Director William Casey and other close friends and confidants of Cohn.<\/p>\n One of these individuals was Robert Keith Gray, the former chairman and CEO of the powerful Washington-based public relations firm of Hill and Knowlton, which\u00a060 Minutes<\/i>\u00a0once called \u201can unelected shadow government\u201d due to its influence in the capitol. According to\u00a0the\u00a0Washington Post<\/i><\/a>, Gray himself was \u201cone of the most sought-after lobbyists in Washington\u201d and a\u00a0Post\u00a0<\/i>reporter once called him \u201ca kind of legend in this town, \u2026the man in the black tuxedo with snow-white hair and a smile like a diamond.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet, Gray was much more than a powerful PR executive.<\/p>\n Gray, who had previously been\u00a0a close adviser<\/a>\u00a0to both Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard Nixon, was a very successful Republican fundraiser who \u201ccollects money in six-figure globs,\u201d according to\u00a0a 1974 report<\/a>\u00a0in the\u00a0Washingtonian.<\/i>\u00a0He first came into close contact with what would become Ronald Reagan\u2019s inner circle during Reagan\u2019s unsuccessful 1976 presidential campaign and later as deputy director of communications during Reagan\u2019s campaign in 1980. The latter position would see him work directly under William Casey, who later became CIA director.<\/p>\n Gray would go on to co-chair Reagan\u2019s Inauguration Committee and afterwards would return to the PR business, taking on\u00a0several clients<\/a>\u00a0including Saudi arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi and hedge fund manager Marc Rich. Both Khashoggi and Rich will be discussed more in detail in Part III of this report \u2014 particularly Rich, who was an asset of Israeli intelligence outfit Mossad, and whose later criminal pardon by Bill Clinton was largely orchestrated by members of the Mega Group like Michael Steinhardt and Israeli politicians like Ehud Barak.<\/p>\n The connection between Gray and Casey is particulary telling, as it was later revealed by former Nebraska state senator-turned-investigator John DeCamp that Gray was\u00a0a specialist<\/a>\u00a0in homosexual blackmail operations for the CIA and was reported to have collaborated with Roy Cohn in those activities. Cohn and Gray were likely to have known each other well, as during Reagan\u2019s 1980 presidential campaign Casey \u2014 then Gray\u2019s boss \u2014 was calling Roy Cohn \u201cevery day,\u201d according to Cohn\u2019s former switchboard operator\u00a0Christine Seymour<\/a>.<\/p>\n Gray was a known associate of CIA agent and Naval Intelligence officer Edwin Wilson, having served in the 1970s on the board of Consultants International, an organization that Wilson had founded and that the CIA used as a front company. Though Gray attempted to distance himself from Wilson after the latter was caught illegally selling weapons to Libya in 1983, a Navy review of Wilson\u2019s intelligence career,\u00a0unearthed by journalist Peter Maas<\/a>, stated that Gray described Wilson as a man of \u201cunqualified trust\u201d and that Gray and Wilson had been in professional contact \u201ctwo or three times a month\u201d as early as 1963.<\/p>\n Though Wilson\u2019s main specialty was front companies used to covertly ship and smuggle goods on behalf of U.S. intelligence, he also ran sexual blackmail operations for the CIA, particularly around the time of the Watergate scandal, according to his former partner and fellow agent at the CIA, Frank Terpil.<\/p>\n Terpil\u00a0later told<\/a>\u00a0author and investigative journalist Jim Hougan:<\/p>\n Historically, one of Wilson\u2019s Agency jobs was to subvert members of both houses [of Congress] by any means necessary\u2026. Certain people could be easily coerced by living out their sexual fantasy in the flesh\u2026. A remembrance of these occasions [was] permanently recorded via selected cameras\u2026. The technicians in charge of filming \u2026 [were] TSD [Technical Services Division of the CIA]. The unwitting porno stars advanced in their political careers, some of [whom] may still be in office.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n According to Terpil, Wilson ran his operation out of the George Town Club, owned by lobbyist and Korean intelligence asset Tongsun Park. According to\u00a0the\u00a0Washington Post<\/i><\/a>, Park set up the club on behalf of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency \u201cas a primary means in an illegal effort to influence U.S. politicians and officials.\u201d The president of the George Town Club\u00a0at the time<\/a>\u00a0of Wilson\u2019s alleged activities at the site was Robert Keith Gray.<\/p>\n DeCamp\u00a0later reported<\/a>\u00a0that Wilson\u2019s activities were a spin-off of the same sexual blackmail operation in which Cohn became involved during the McCarthy era with Lewis Rosenstiel and J. Edgar Hoover.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The operation allegedly ran by Gray and Wilson was not the only sexual blackmail operation connected to Cohn\u2019s network or to influential American politicians of the era. Another pedophile network that was connected to a close associate of former President George H.W. Bush in the early 1990s was run as an affiliate of the Catholic charity Covenant House, which was founded and run by Father Bruce Ritter.<\/p>\n In 1968, Ritter asked\u00a0his superior<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 Cardinal Francis Spellman of the Archdiocese of New York \u2014 for permission to take homeless teenagers, boys and girls, into his home in Manhattan. As was noted in Part I of this series, Spellman was accused of pedophilia and ordained known pedophiles while serving as the highest-ranking Catholic priest in the United States. Spellman was also a close associate, client and friend of Roy Cohn, as well as of his law partner Tom Bolan, and Spellman was alleged to have been seen at least one of Cohn\u2019s \u201cblackmail parties.\u201d In addition, Spellman\u2019s nephew, Ned Spellman,\u00a0worked for<\/a>\u00a0Roy Cohn, according to\u00a0LIFE\u00a0<\/i>magazine.<\/p>\n Ritter, like Spellman and other priests who served under Spellman, was\u00a0eventually accused<\/a>\u00a0of having sexual relationships with many of the underaged boys he had taken in, and of spending Covenant House funds on lavish gifts and payments to the vulnerable teenagers he exploited.<\/p>\n One of Ritter\u2019s victims, Darryl Bassile,\u00a0wrote an open letter<\/a>\u00a0to him a year after the priest\u2019s preying on teenage boys was exposed by the press: \u201cYou were wrong for inflicting your desires on a 14-year-old .\u2009.\u2009. I know that someday you will stand before the one who judges all of us and at that time there will be no more denial, just the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n Notably, when Ritter\u2019s activities at Covenant House were exposed in 1989 by the\u00a0New York Post<\/i>, Charles M. Sennott, the\u00a0Post<\/i>\u00a0reporter who wrote the story, would\u00a0later state<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cthe secular powers more than the archdiocese or the Franciscans protected him [Ritter].\u201d Sennott\u2019s report was\u00a0attacked viciously<\/a>\u00a0by columnists in other New York media outlets, powerful politicians including then-Governor of New York Mario Cuomo, as well as by Cardinal Spellman\u2019s successor, Cardinal John O\u2019Connor.<\/p>\n The likely reason these \u201csecular powers\u201d came to the aid of the embattled Ritter, who was never charged for having sexual relationships with minors and was merely forced to resign from his post, is that Covenant House and Ritter himself were\u00a0deeply tied<\/a>\u00a0to Robert Macauley, Bush Sr.\u2019s roommate at Yale and\u00a0a long-time friend<\/a>\u00a0of the Bush family. Macauley was described by the\u00a0New York Times<\/i>\u00a0as \u201cinstrumental\u201d to Covenant House fundraising after he joined its board in 1985 and brought on several \u201cother wealthy or well-connected people,\u201d including former government officials and investment bankers.<\/p>\n George Bush and first lady Barbara meet residents at New York\u2019s Convent House, June 22, 1989. Father Bruce Ritter is seated in the background. Rick Bowmen | AP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Macauley\u2019s organization, the AmeriCares Foundation, which was later accused of\u00a0funneling money to the Contras<\/a>\u00a0in Central America, was one of the main sources of funding of Covenant House. One of the members of AmeriCares advisory board was William E. Simon, former U.S. secretary of the treasury under the Nixon and Ford administrations, who\u00a0also ran<\/a>\u00a0the Nicaraguan Freedom Fund, which sent aid to the Contras.<\/p>\n AmeriCares was also known to work directly with U.S. intelligence. As the\u00a0Hartford Courant<\/i>\u00a0noted<\/a>\u00a0in 1991: \u201cKnowledgeable former federal officials, many with backgrounds in intelligence work, help AmeriCares maneuver in delicate international political environments.\u201d<\/p>\n Furthermore, Ritter was known to have visited Macauley\u2019s Connecticut estate and served as Vice President of AmeriCares until he was forced to resign from Covenant House. Notably, George H.W. Bush\u2019s brother, Prescott, was also on the AmeriCares\u00a0advisory board<\/a>. After George H.W. Bush died last year, AmeriCares\u00a0stated<\/a>\u00a0that he had been \u201cinstrumental in founding the health-focused relief and development organization.\u201d<\/p>\n Years before Ritter was outed as a pedophile who preyed on the disadvantaged and vulnerable teenagers who sought refuge at his charity, Covenant House was praised heavily by President Ronald Reagan, even earning a mention in his 1984 State of the Union address, which called Ritter one of the country\u2019s \u201cunsung heroes.\u201d From 1985 to 1989, Covenant House\u2019s operating budget grew from\u00a0$27\u2009million to $90 million<\/a>\u00a0and its board came to include powerful individuals including top executives at IBM, Chase Manhattan Bank and Bear Stearns.<\/p>\n It was during this time that Covenant House grew into an international organization, opening branches in several countries, including Canada, Mexico and elsewhere in Central America. Its first branch in Central America was opened in Guatemala and was headed by Roberto Alejos Arzu, a CIA asset\u00a0whose plantation<\/a>was used to train the troops used in the CIA\u2019s failed \u201cBay of Pigs\u201d invasion of Cuba. Alejos Arzu was also an associate of the former U.S.-backed dictator of Nicaragua, Anastasio Somoza, and\u00a0a member<\/a>\u00a0of the Knights of Malta, a Catholic order to which former CIA Director William Casey and Roy Cohn\u2019s law partner Tom Bolan also belonged. Alejos Arzu\u00a0also worked for<\/a>\u00a0AmeriCares and was tied to several Central American paramilitary groups.<\/p>\n Intelligence community sources\u00a0cited by<\/a>\u00a0DeCamp assert that the Alejos Arzu-led branch of Covenant House procured children for a pedophile ring based in the United States. Years later, Mi Casa, another U.S.-run charity in Guatemala that George H.W. Bush had personally toured with his wife Barbara in 1994,\u00a0was accused<\/a>of rampant pedophilia and child abuse.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n After having left his job as an\u00a0ABC News<\/i>\u00a0correspondent in the 1980s, Craig Spence found success as a prominent conservative Washington lobbyist. Spence would soon find his fortunes shift dramatically when, in June 1989, it was revealed that he had been pimping out children to the power elite in the nation\u2019s capital throughout the 1980s in apartments that were bugged with video and audio recording equipment. Much like Jeffrey Epstein, who ran a similar operation, Spence was often likened to Jay Gatsby, the mysterious, wealthy figure from the well-known Fitzgerald novel\u00a0The Great Gatsby.<\/i><\/p>\n A\u00a01982\u00a0New York Times<\/i>\u00a0article<\/a>\u00a0written about Spence said that his \u201cpersonal phone book and party guest lists constitute a \u2018Who\u2019s Who\u2019 in Congress, Government and journalism\u201d and stated that Spence was \u201chired by his clients as much for whom he knows as what he knows.\u201d Spence was also known to throw lavish parties, which the\u00a0Times<\/i>\u00a0described as \u201cglitter[ed] with notables, from ambassadors to television stars, from senators to senior State Department officials.\u201d Roy Cohn, William Casey and Roy Cohn\u2019s journalist friend William Safire were just some of the other attendees at Spence\u2019s festivities.<\/p>\n \u201cAccording to Mr. Spence,\u201d the\u00a0Times<\/i>\u00a0article continues,\u00a0\u201c<\/i>Richard Nixon is a friend. So is [former Attorney General under Nixon] John Mitchell. [CBS<\/i>\u00a0journalist] Eric Sevareid is termed \u2018an old, dear friend.\u2019 Senator John Glenn is \u2018a good friend\u2019 and Peter Ustinov [British actor and journalist] is \u2018an old, old friend.\u2019\u201d Notably, Ustinov\u00a0wrote for<\/a>\u00a0The European\u00a0<\/i>newspaper soon after it was founded in 1990 by Robert Maxwell, the father of Epstein\u2019s alleged madam Ghislaine Maxwell and a known Mossad agent.<\/p>\n It was revealed just seven years after the\u00a0Times\u2019<\/i>\u00a0published its doting profile of Spence that his \u201cglittery parties for key officials of the Reagan and Bush administrations, media stars and top military officers\u201d had been bugged in order \u201cto compromise guests.\u201d According to\u00a0the explosive report published by the\u00a0Washington Times<\/i><\/a>, Spence was linked to a \u201chomosexual prostuition ring\u201d whose clients included \u201cgovernment officials, locally based U.S. military officers, businessmen, lawyers, bankers, congressional aides, media representatives and other professionals.\u201d Spence also offered cocaine to his guests as another means of acquiring blackmail.<\/p>\n According to the report, Spence\u2019s home \u201cwas bugged and had a secret two-way mirror, and \u2026 he attempted to ensnare visitors into compromising sexual encounters that he could then use as leverage.\u201d One man\u00a0who spoke to the\u00a0Washington Times<\/i><\/a>\u00a0said that Spence sent a limousine to his home, which took him to a party where \u201cseveral young men tried to become friendly with him.\u201d According to DeCamp, Spence was known to offer young children for sex to attendees at his blackmail parties, along with illegal drugs like cocaine.<\/p>\n Several other sources, including a Reagan White House official and an Air Force sergeant who had attended Spence-hosted parties, confirmed that Spence\u2019s house was filled with recording equipment, which he regularly used to spy on and record guests, and his house also included a two-way mirror that he used for eavesdropping.<\/p>\n The report also documented Spence\u2019s connections to U.S. intelligence, particularly the CIA. According to\u00a0the\u00a0Washington Times<\/i>\u00a0report<\/a>, Spence \u201coften boasted that he was working for the CIA and on one occasion said he was going to disappear for awhile \u2018because he had an important CIA assignment.\u2019\u201d He was also quite paranoid about his alleged work for the agency, as he expressed concern \u201cthat the CIA might \u2018doublecross him\u2019 and kill him instead and then make it look like a suicide.\u201d Not long after the\u00a0Washington Times<\/i>\u00a0report on his activities was published, Spence was found dead in the Boston Ritz Carlton and his death was quickly ruled a suicide.<\/p>\n The\u00a0Washington Times<\/i>\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0also offers a clue as to what Spence may have done for the CIA, as it cited sources that had claimed that Spence had spoken of smuggling cocaine into the U.S. from El Salvador, an operation that he claimed had involved U.S. military personnel. Given the timing of these comments from Spence, Spence\u2019s powerful connections, and the CIA\u2019s involvement in the exchange of cocaine for weapons in the Iran Contra scandal, his comments may have been much more than just boasts intended to impress his party guests.<\/p>\n One of the most critical parts of the scandal surrounding Spence, however, was the fact that he had been able to enter the White House late at night during the George H.W. Bush administration with young men whom\u00a0the\u00a0Washington Times<\/i>\u00a0described<\/a>\u00a0as \u201ccall boys.\u201d<\/p>\n Spence\u00a0later stated<\/a>\u00a0that his contacts within the White House, which allowed him and his \u201ccall boys\u201d access, were \u201ctop level\u201d officials and he specifically singled out George H.W. Bush\u2019s then-National Security Advisor Donald Gregg. Gregg had worked at the CIA since 1951 before he resigned in 1982 to become National Security Advisor to Bush, who was then vice president. Prior to resigning from his post at the CIA, Gregg had worked directly under William Casey and, in the late 1970s,\u00a0alongside<\/a>\u00a0a young William Barr in stonewalling the congressional Pike Committee and Church Committee, which investigated the CIA beginning in 1975. Among the things that they were tasked with investigating were\u00a0the CIA\u2019s \u201clove traps,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0or sexual blackmail operations used to lure foreign diplomats to bugged apartments, complete with recording equipment and two-way mirrors.<\/p>\n Barr would later become Bush\u2019s Attorney General, rising to that post yet again under Trump. Furthermore, Barr\u2019s father worked for the precursor to the CIA, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and\u00a0recruited<\/a>\u00a0a young Jeffrey Epstein, then a high school drop-out, to teach at the elite Dalton School, from which Epstein was later fired. A year prior to hiring Epstein, Donald Barr published a science fiction fantasy novel\u00a0about sex slavery<\/a>. Notably,\u00a0the same year<\/a>\u00a0Donald Barr hired Epstein, his son was working for the CIA. Bill Barr has refused calls to recuse himself from the Epstein case, even though he worked at the same law firm that has represented Epstein in the past.<\/p>\n Donald Gregg is also connected to Roy Cohn\u2019s \u201cinfluence machine\u201d through\u00a0his daughter\u2019s marriage<\/a>\u00a0to Christopher Buckley, the son of conservative journalist William Buckley, close confidant and friend of both Roy Cohn and Cohn\u2019s law partner Tom Bolan.<\/p>\n The\u00a0Washington Times<\/i>\u00a0reports on Spence\u2019s child sex ring also reveal his close ties to none other than the ubiquitous Roy Cohn. One of the\u00a0Times<\/i>\u2019 sources for\u00a0its first story<\/a>\u00a0on the scandal alleged that he had attended a birthday party for Roy Cohn that Spence had hosted at his home and that CIA Director William Casey was also in attendance. Spence was also said in the report to often brag about his social companions and regularly mentioned Cohn and claimed to have hosted Cohn at his house on occasions other than the aforementioned birthday party.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The revelation of Craig Spence\u2019s \u201ccall boy ring\u201d soon led to the discovery of the infamous Franklin child sex abuse and ritual murder scandal. That sordid operation was run out of Omaha, Nebraska\u00a0by Larry King<\/a>, a prominent local Republican activist and lobbyist who ran the Franklin Community Federal Credit Union until it was shut down by federal authorities.<\/p>\n Buried in a May 1989 article in the\u00a0Omaha World Herald\u2019s<\/i>\u00a0probe into King\u2019s Credit Union and sex ring<\/a>,\u00a0is a telling revelation: \u201cIn the 61\/2\u00a0months since federal authorities closed Franklin, rumors have persisted that money from the credit union somehow found its way to the Nicaraguan contra rebels.\u201d<\/p>\n The possibility that King\u2019s fraudulent credit union was covertly funding the Contras was supported by\u00a0subsequent reporting<\/a>\u00a0by the\u00a0Houston Post\u2019s<\/i>\u00a0Pete Brewton, who discovered that the CIA, in conjunction with organized crime, had secretly borrowed money from various savings and loans (S&L) institutions to fund covert operations. One of those S&Ls had Neil Bush, George H.W. Bush\u2019s son, on its board and it had done business with King\u2019s organization.<\/p>\n Another link between King and the Iran Contra team is the fact that King\u00a0had co-founded and subsequently donated over $25,000<\/a>\u00a0to an organization affiliated with the Reagan administration, Citizens for America, which sponsored speaking trips for Lt. Col. Oliver North and Contra leaders. The director of Citizens for America at the time was David Carmen, who simultaneously\u00a0ran a public relations firm<\/a>\u00a0with the\u00a0former head<\/a>\u00a0of covert operations at the Casey-led CIA, his father Gerald, who had also been appointed by Reagan to head the General Services Administration and to a subsequent ambassadorship.<\/p>\n One of the investigative journalists who researched the Craig Spence ring\u00a0later told DeCamp<\/a>\u00a0that Spence\u2019s ring was connected to King:<\/p>\n The way we discovered Larry King and his Nebraska-based call boy ring, was by looking through the credit card chits of Spence\u2019s ring, where we found King\u2019s name.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n It\u00a0was later revealed<\/a>\u00a0that King and Spence were essentially business partners as their child trafficking rings were operated under a larger group that was nicknamed \u201cBodies by God.\u201d<\/p>\n Exactly how many groups operated under this umbrella group, \u201cBodies by God,\u201d is unknown. Yet, what is known is that the rings run by both King and Spence were connected to each other and both were also connected to prominent officials in the Reagan and subsequent George H.W. Bush administrations, including officials with ties to the CIA and Roy Cohn and his network.<\/p>\n Indeed Spence, just months before his alleged suicide in the Boston Ritz Carlton,\u00a0had hinted<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0Washington Times<\/i>\u00a0reporters Michael Hedges and Jerry Seper, who had originally broken the story, that they had merely scratched the surface of something much darker:<\/p>\n All this stuff you\u2019ve uncovered [involving call boys, bribery and the White House tours], to be honest with you, is insignificant compared to other things I\u2019ve done. But I\u2019m not going to tell you those things, and somehow the world will carry on.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n It is also worth noting the role of the FBI in all of this, particularly in the Franklin child sex abuse scandal. Indeed, Larry King\u2019s child sex abuse ring was\u00a0quickly and aggressively covered up<\/a>\u00a0by the FBI, which used a variety of under-handed tactics to bury the reality of King\u2019s sordid operation. Here, it is important to recall the key role former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover played in similar sexual blackmail operations that abused children (See\u00a0Part I<\/a>) and the close relationship between Hoover, Roy Cohn and Lewis Rosenstiel, who later employed Hoover\u2019s former right-hand man at the FBI, Louis Nichols.<\/p>\n Years later,\u00a0documents released<\/a>\u00a0by the FBI would show that Epstein became an FBI informant in 2008, when Robert Mueller was the Bureau\u2019s director, in exchange for immunity from then-pending federal charges, a deal that fell through with Epstein\u2019s recent arrest on new federal charges. In addition, former FBI Director Louis Freeh\u00a0would be hired<\/a>\u00a0by Alan Dershowitz, who is accused of raping girls at Epstein\u2019s homes and was once a character witness for Roy Cohn, to intimidate Epstein\u2019s victims. As previously mentioned, Freeh\u2019s past appointment as a judge for the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York\u00a0was orchestrated by<\/a>\u00a0Cohn\u2019s law partner Tom Bolan.<\/p>\n Thus, the FBI\u2019s cover-up of the Franklin case is just one example of the Bureau\u2019s long-standing practice of protecting these pedophile rings when they involve members of the American political elite and provide the Bureau with a steady supply of blackmail. It also makes it worth questioning the impartiality of one of the main prosecutors in the Jeffrey Epstein case,\u00a0Maurene Comey<\/a>, who is the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n While there were several sexual trafficking operations connected to both Roy Cohn and the halls of power under the Reagan administration, in a matter of months after Cohn\u2019s death it appears that another individual became a central figure in the powerful network that Cohn had cultivated.<\/p>\n That individual, Jeffrey Epstein, would be recruited, after his firing from the Dalton School, by Alan \u201cAce\u201d Greenberg, a\u00a0close friend\u00a0<\/a>of Cohn, to work at Bear Stearns. After leaving Bear Stearns and working as an alleged financial \u201cbounty hunter\u201d for clients that are said to have included the\u00a0Iran-Contra-linked arms dealer<\/a>\u00a0Adnan Khashoggi, Epstein would come into contact with Leslie Wexner, a billionaire close to the Meyer Lansky-linked Bronfman family, who himself was tied to members of organized crime syndicates once represented by Cohn.<\/p>\n The same year that Wexner would begin his decades-long association with Epstein, another Cohn friend with ties to the Reagan White House and the Trump family, Ronald Lauder, would provide Epstein with an Austrian passport containing Epstein\u2019s picture but a false name.<\/p>\n Lauder, Wexner and the Bronfmans are members of an elite organization known as the Mega Group, which also includes other Meyer Lansky-connected \u201cphilanthropists\u201d like hedge fund manager\u00a0Michael Steinhardt<\/a>. While Epstein shares considerable overlap with the network described in this report and\u00a0Part I<\/a>\u00a0of this series, he is also deeply connected to the Mega Group as well as its associates, including Ghislaine Maxwell\u2019s father, Robert Maxwell.<\/p>\n Part III of this series will focus on the Mega Group and its ties to the network that has been described in Parts I and II. In addition, the role of the state of Israel, the Mossad, and several global pro-Israel lobby organizations will also be discussed in relation to this network of sexual blackmail operations and Jeffrey Epstein.<\/p>\n It is here that the full breadth of the Epstein scandal comes into view. It is a criminal and unconscionable blackmail operation that has been run by influential figures, hidden in plain sight, for over half a century, exploiting and destroying the lives of untold numbers of children in the process. Over the years, it has grown many branches and spread well beyond the United States, as seen by the activity of Covenant House in Latin America and Epstein\u2019s own international effort to recruit more girls to be abused and exploited.<\/p>\n All of this has taken place with the full knowledge and blessing of top figures in the world of \u201cphilanthropy\u201d and in the U.S. government and intelligence communities, with great influence over several presidential administrations, particularly since the rise of Ronald Reagan and continuing through to Donald Trump.<\/p>\n Feature photo | \u00a0Claudio Cabrera | MintPress News<\/p>\n\u201cRoy could fix anyone in the city\u201d<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\nPolitically ubiquitous and polygamous<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\nCohn, Murdoch and the Contras<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n\u201cThe man in the black tuxedo\u201d<\/h2>\n
Father Ritter and his favored youths<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\nThe downfall of \u201cWashington\u2019s Jay Gatsby\u201d<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cBodies by God\u201d<\/h2>\n
The rot at the top<\/h2>\n