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180-10110-10121

2025 RELEASE UNDER THE PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY ASSASSINATION RECORDS ACT OF 1992

JFK Assassination System

Identification Form

Agency Information

AGENCY: HSCA

RECORD NUMBER : 180-10110-10121

RECORD SERIES :

SECURITY CLASSIFIED FILES

AGENCY FILE NUMBER: 151-JFK

Document Information

ORIGINATOR:

FROM:

TO :

TITLE :

HSCA

DATE :

PAGES:

SUBJECTS:

06/02/1978

7

OS.WALD, LEE, POST-RUSSIAN PERIOD, TRAVEL, TRIP TO

MEXICO

CIA

DOCUMENT TYPE: SUMMARY

CLASSIFICATION: Unclassified

RESTRICTIONS: 1B

CURRENT STATUS : Redact

DATE OF LAST REVIEW: 08/07/1997

OPENING CRITERIA :

COMMENTS :

Box 5.

v9.1

NH 50955

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KENNEDY

000044

SELECT COMMITTEE ON ASSASSINATIONS

Name Arnold Arehart (psydo)

Address Mexico City

Date 6/2/78

Time 2:00 pm

Place American Embassy, Mexico

Interview:

Mr. Arehart was interviewed by HSCA Staff members Gary Cornwell,

Dan Hardway, Edwin Lopez, and Harold Leap. He was shown a copy of the

CIA omnibus release letter and stated that he understood that it released

him of any secrecy agreement he may have signed while employed by the

CIA.

Mr. Arehart was assigned to Mexico City as a technician in 1960.

Mr. Arehart worked continuously on one project until his retirement

after Phillip Agee's revelations compromised his project. Mr. Arehart

worked outside the U.S. Embassy under deep cover., He worked inside of

the base that monitored and taped the telephones that were subject to

the CIA/Mexican liaison tapping operation. His specific duty was to

do all technical

work required in the base and to keep the equipment in :

working order.

Mr. Arehart stated that the base monitored 30 telephones, i.e.,

there were thirty incoming lines and thirty tape machines to record the

conversations.

He stated that he was not sure where the taps were placed

or how many taps were in what locations. Mr. Arehart was in contact,

routinely, with Anne Goodpasture and Win Scott. He said that there was

Interviewer Signature

Typed Signature

(more)

6/19/78

Date transcribed

BY:

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000045

PAGE TWO.

counterpart to him in the base in that he represented the Americans and

his counterpart represented

the Mexicans.

He said that the counterpart's

name was fnu Coseo.

Coseo's father was the Mexican official in charge

of the Mexican's involvement in the operations. Mr. Arehart was not at

all clear about the role of Coseo Sr.

. The tapeing

equipment was impulse activated in that a call

coming

into or going

out of the tapped phone would automatically

activate the recorders.

Mr. Arehart said that he was the only American in the base.

He said that there were 6 to 8 Mexicans who monitored the conversations

and transcribed the tapes. As the Mexicans monitored the conversations

they would make summaries of the important conversations.

It was up to

the monitors to decide which conversations were important enough to

summarize. Arehart was not aware of any instruction that was provided

the Mexican monitors on which conversations should be deemed important.

In addition to the summaries, the tapes from the Cuban taps and the

Spanish language portions of the tapes from

the Soviet taps were

transcribed in the base. Arehart turned the summaries, Cuban transcripts,

Russian (Spanish) transcripts, and the Russian tapes, over to his contact.

He stated that his routine contact was Anne Goodpasture and that he just

assumed that she was the case officer for the project. even though he

claims

that he received his orders directly from Win Scott by telephone.

Summaries were always delivered very early in the morning the day after

a conversation occured. The transcripts were literal transcriptions.

Mr. Arehart said that sometimes, if the Mexican monitors felt something

was really important, tapes and transcripts were passed immediately

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PAGE THREE.

000046

to Ms. Goodpasture.

Mr. Arehart stated that he believed that the summaries would

have been maintained at the station, probably in a chronological file.

Mr. Arehart was questioned extensively about the retention

and erasure of tapes used in the listening post. Mr. Arehart said that

the tapes produced at the base would fall into three catagories:

1) tapes produced by taps on Cuban related phones;

2) tapes produced by taps on

Soviet related phones;

3) tapes produced by taps on other phones such as Mexican radicals, poli-

ticians, etc.

Mr. Arehart said that the tapes produced by the Cuban taps were maintained

in the listening post. He said that he had a special rack for these

tapes in his workshop which

was on the floor above the room in which

the listening post was situated. This rack had thirty slots in it.

The tapes from each day's production went into a seperate slot. with

the oldest tapes going back into use in the monitor room, i.e. the tapes

from the Cuban tapes were held for thirty days before reuse. Mr. Arehart

said that he routinely got requests for delivery of specific Cuban

tapes from Ann Goodpasture but that the tapes were not routinely given

to her unless she asked for them.

Mr. Arehart said that the Russian tapes were routinely given

to Ms. Goodpasture so that she could get them to the Russian transcribers.

He said that not all of these tapes were returned to him. He said that

he knew this because his supply of tapes for the Russian taps kept

dwindling. He assumes, while claiming no actual knowledge, that tapes

were routinely retained by either the Russian translator or someone in

the Station. He does not know which because he claims to have no :

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000027

PAGE FOUR.

knowledge about what happened to the tapes after they left his possession

and before they were returned to him. He said that the tapes were

returned to him already erased and ready for use.

Tapes from the third catagory were not held for very long and

were routinely re-used, usually within a day or so after they were

taped.

Mr. Arehart said that he was not aware of any other surveillance

operations in Mexico City. He said that he assumed that there was photo-

graphic surveillance since the Agency would not be fulfilling their

obligations if they did not have it. Mr. Arehart said that there was

a process whereby the station could be notified that an interesting

individual, or an individual whom the station was interested in, was

at, or was going to be at, one of the Embassies. Mr. Arehart said that

in such a situation the monitor would bring it to his attention and he

would then call Ms. Goodpasture and alert her. Mr. Arehart stated that

his

second duty at the base was to alert the station to anything

important.

Mr. Arehart said that he did not know what happened to the

Soviet tapes. He did say that for a short time he was responsible for

delivering the tapes to Boris Tarasoff in order to expedite the process.

Mr. Arehart said that he did

remember a man named "Rudy" but he did not

remember what he did or what he looked like.

Mr Arehart said that it was possible that one of the Mexican

agents transcribed English language conversations. He said that these

convesations (tapes) were usually sent to the Embassy. He was not at

all certain on these points. He said that on English conversations that

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PAGE FIVE.

000018

he remembers

that

a Mexican would often

come to the second floor and

ask him to come and listen

to

the conversation.

Mr. Arehart was questioned about whether there was a process

whereby transcription of important conversations in English or Russian

could be expedited.

He explained that there would not be such a

process

for

a Russian conversation since they could not judge the

importance of the conversation due to the fact that no one in the

base understood Russian. He said that there was such a procedure for

English conversations. He siad that after listening to the conversation

and deeming it important he would Mark the tape "Urgent" and would

put it in a box and deliver it.

Mr. Arehart said that when he worked with Tarasoff that he

would pick up the tapes to reuse as well as drop them off for trans-

cription. He said that he did not pick up the transcripts from Tarasoff

and has no idea about what happened to them. Mr. Arehart said that

he did not receive all of the tapes back and just assumed that they

-had been retained because of interest in the conversations contained on

them. He said this was routine. After getting the tapes back, either

from Tarasoff or Goodpasture depending on the time period, he would

put them back into the working

order. The tapes were not retained after

they were returned to the base.

Mr Arehart said that the tape machines were activated at

approximately 7:00 a.m. They were turned off at 11:00 p.m.

Mr. Arehart said that the Russian tapes were taken off the

machines on a daily basis for delivery to Goodpasture or Tarasoff.

The Cuban tapes were left on the machines until the reel was full.

They were then removed and transcribed.

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000049

PAGE SIX.

Mr. Arehart said that Lee Harvey Oswald never came to his attention

prior to the assassination. He does not know whether or not he was

ever asked to retain, or turn over to the station, any tape containing

Oswald's voice. He explained that

such requests would be made to

him by giving him the tape number and that he never knew what was

on. any particular tape that was requested from him. He has never

heard of a tape of Oswald existing nor has he heard that such

tapes did not exist; he has simply never discussed it.

Mr. Arehart stated that there was a file of transcripts

maintained at the base of the transcripts that were produced at the

base.

He remembered that after the assassination someone requested

that those files be checked. Mr. Arehart said that he was not certain

but thought that they had located one short conversation either by

or about Oswald. Mr. Arehart could not remember the details of that

conversation. He stated that he does not know what happened to the

files that were maintained at the base station after his retirement.

Mr. Arehart said that we were the first people to ever talk

to him about these events.

He said that he has never talked to any-

one from the CIA about these things. He confirmed that he had never

been contacted by anyone from the IG staff in regards to the assassin

nation or Lee Harvey Oswald's trip to Mexico. Mr. Arehart said that

he had never discussed the case with anyone in the Mexico CIA station,

either at the time or since then.

Mr. Arehart said that he did not get along with Anne Good-

pasture. He said that she was a "show must go on type" that would

get angry if she tried to contact him and he happened to be out to

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PAGE SEVEN.

Mr. Arehart said that Ann was

SO

efficient that it was often very

irratating. He said that Win Scott was also very efficient.

Mr. Arehart said that he

believed that the listening post

used Ampex 701's to tape the conversations they intercepted. Не

said that the calls were monitored by the three or four of the

employees as they came in. These employees prepared the 1og

sheets and the resumen (summary). The reels were then given to

the transcribers who fixed the times and reel footage cite numbers

to the specific conversations

on the transcripts.

Mr. Arehart said

that the times on the transcripts would be accurate, usually, within

15 minutes more or less.

Mr. Arehart was shown transcripts from the Soviet and

Cuban Embassy taps.

These transcripts were in the Spanish language.

He identified them as transcripts produced in the base.

000050

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