News stories from Saturday June 2, 1973
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- John W. Dean has told the chief counsel for the Senate Watergate committee that he met alone and in small groups with President Nixon more than 40 times between last January and early April of this year, sources close to Mr. Dean said. Mr. Dean, the former White House counsel, said this, according to sources, during a more than four-hour private conference with Samuel Dash, the committee counsel. In that conference, Mr. Dean said that he could supply firsthand testimony about those meetings that he believed would show that Mr. Nixon has "substantial knowledge" of what White House officials were doing about the Watergate investigation, one closely involved source said. [New York Times]
- Contrary to assertions in a sworn statement by former White House aide Egil Krogh, the FBI had knowledge in late June, 1971, that the Soviet government did not possess the Pentagon papers before they were published by the New York Times, according to Justice Department sources. These sources said that although the bulk of the top-secret Defense Department study of the Vietnam war was mysteriously delivered to the Soviet Embassy in Washington, it did not arrive until after the Times had printed its first of three installments from the papers and had been placed under a temporary court order that halted their publication. [New York Times]
- A Los Angeles County grand jury will begin its investigation Tuesday of the break-in at the office of Dr. Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist, and it has two main questions to explore: Who knew about the break-in before and after it happened, and was their conduct criminal? "We are interested in whether or not there was a conspiracy to commit a crime or burglary or malicious trespassing," explained District Attorney Joseph P. Busch in an interview. "We know a certain group had certain authority to a certain thing. Whether that amounted to criminal activity depends on what the witnesses have to say," Mr. Busch said. [New York Times]
- Wednesday is graduation day at the United State Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, and 844 members of the Class of 1973 are preparing themselves for what academy officials hope will be a display of pride, purpose and shorter haircuts. It is an annual day to renew faith in the 18-year-old academy, but that won't be easy this year. The academy is in trouble, and its cadets are leaving in record numbers. [New York Times]
- Seven crew members were dead, nine others were missing and presumed dead after an American cargo ship, outbound in the early morning darkness, impaled her prow amidships of an oil-laden Belgian tanker at anchor in the Narrows of New York Harbor, touching off an inferno of explosions and fire. The American ship was the Sea Witch, a 610-foot containership. She plowed into the starboard side of the 700-foot Esso Brussels, spilling oil from the tanker that ignited and covered the surrounding water with flames, which partially engulfed both ships. [New York Times]
- A terrorist shot and killed an American military adviser outside his home in Teheran, Iran, and then fled on a motorcycle driven by a second man, the United States Embassy reported. The embassy identified the slain American as Lieut. Col. Lewis Hawkins, 42 years old, of Plymouth, Ind. After the shooting, the Iranian police posted guards at American installations, including three American schools. [New York Times]
- King Constantine II held a dramatic news conference in the garden of his villa in Rome and said earnestly that he was confident of returning to Greece as guardian of constitutional liberties. In a statement, in English, that he read to about 100 newsmen, the King said: "The real problem lies not in whether Greece should have a democracy with or without a King, but whether she should have a democracy at all, and whether the people of Greece has the right to be master of its fate and to enjoy its freedom." [New York Times]