CIA Reading Room cia-rdp88-01315r000300380052-4: SUPERSLEUTHING: FAIR MEANS OR FOUL

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~ p roved For Release 2004p.,1,/01 : CIA-RDP88-01315R00030Q' .b@0.5k P, , t CI C, 18 July 1977 Supersleuthing: Fair Means or Foul Need to check out a job applicant? Get rid of some electronic bugs? Find out about the extracurricular activities of a wandering mate? Look into a cred- it rating? Nick Beltrante-a remarkably active private eye-may be your man. A stocky fellow with curly red hair; Beltrante, 49, runs Investigations, Inc., 'his own twelve-person detective agency, out of Alexandria, Va. He is just as proud of the autographed pictures of George McGovern and Gerald Ford on the wall as he is of the electronic tools of his sometimes esoteric trade. It was he who debugged the Democratic Na- tional Committee headquarters in the Watergate after the White House plumbers were caught wiring the place. And four years later, Ford's election committee hired Beltrante to screen ap- plicants for key strategy posts. Beltrante admits that he breaks the 81 law almost every day, and he boasts il- legal sources in state and federal law en- forcement agencies, banks and credit bureaus. He claims he can call upon friendly congressional aides to pry out private reports on people from the In- ternal Revenue Service, the Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence A enc He will ay an em loee of ma y Bell .as uch as $250 for an unlisted phone number, but notes that the pay- ola has inflated from $25 before passage in 1974 ofthe Privacy Act, designed to shield citizens from at least some inva- sions of privacy by the Government. Since then, Beltrante gripes, some of his phone company sources have dried up, although the law does not directly threaten them. Says Beltrante: "If I can get a per- son's full name, date and place of birth. and Social Security number, I can find out anything else I want to know." Just that much was enough for him to begin unraveling the finances of Robert D. Johnson, a former Chesapeake & Poto- mac Telephone Co. employee involved in a $26 million wine-importing scheme exposed as a fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Beltrante got Johnson's personnel file from a source in the phone company. Then he made con- tact with half a dozen of his sources in banks and discovered that Johnson had several checking accounts and a few out- standing loans. From statements that had been made to get the loans, Bel- trante learned that Johnson held securi- ties worth about $100,000. Through a broker friend, Beltrante got the name of Johnson's broker, who confirmed that Johnson had a secret Swiss account. Finally, through Italian sources, Bel- on a businessman. From a source in the CIA. he has learned that his qua once worked for the agency but ha to re- sign because of menntanessBe irante and another investigator are "negotiat- ing" for details on the man's history at.. a mental hospital. The potential leaker in the hospital wants S500. - Once a banker wondered whether his daughter's fiance was really the man. he said