What, Never? No, Never, Never

For three weeks, the Government had labored mightily with 24 witnesses to establish its charges of conspiracy and obstructing justice against onetime Nixon Cabinet Officers John Mitchell and Maurice Stans. The prosecution seemed to be getting nowhere until last week, when two former high-ranking federal officials who had been at the center of the action took the stand. G. Bradford Cook, onetime counsel and chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and John W. Dean III, once the trusted counsel to the President, offered damning testimony against Mitchell, 60, and Stans, 66. In one of the bitter ironies of the case, both witnesses were giving evidence against old associates who had helped them to climb to power.

Dean, 35, testified first, drawing an overflow crowd of spectators to the Manhattan courtroom. Suddenly it was last summer again, except that this time the man he accused--former Attorney General John Mitchell--was seated 20 ft. away from him. Every detail of Dean's testimony evoked his riveting appearance at the Senate's Watergate hearings --the poker face, the pursed lips, the flat, unemotional voice naming names, dates, places, building a case against the man whom he had once described as his "father figure." Mitchell had been Dean's boss at the Department of Justice, and Dean admitted freely that he was known as "Mitchell's man in the White House." Asked a prosecutor: Had he ever refused to do anything for Mitchell? Dean's reply: No.

Beginning about July 14, 1972, Dean testified, he made eight to twelve phone calls at Mitchell's behest to William J. Casey, then the chairman of the SEC. Dean said that he passed along his mentor's complaints that the SEC was using unfair and harassing tactics against Financier Robert Vesco. The Government has charged that on April 10, 1972, Vesco made a secret contribution of $200,000 to Nixon's 1972 campaign, and that in return Mitchell and Stans tried to hinder an SEC investigation into Vesco's alleged massive looting of Investors Overseas Services, a mutual fund empire that he controlled.

Late in October 1972, testified Dean, Mitchell phoned with a request: he wanted him to get Casey to postpone until after Election Day the appearance before the SEC of several of Vesco's subpoenaed staffers. According to Dean, Mitchell claimed that the sessions, scheduled for Nov. 2, 1972, were "just a further example of harassment. It will be very embarrassing for these secretaries [of Vesco's] to take the Fifth Amendment, and the whole thing is just something we don't need before the election."

"Little Bastards." Dean said that Mitchell seemed to be particularly worried that word would get out about Vesco's close involvement with two of the President's relatives--Donald A. Nixon, 27, the President's nephew and a Vesco aide; and Edward Nixon, 43, the President's brother, who had played a minor role in arranging Vesco's contribution.

After getting Mitchell's call, Dean said, he asked Casey: "Can you do something to get these [subpoenas] postponed?" The answer was no, but the witnesses took the Fifth, and, as it happened, nothing leaked about the Vesco contribution prior to the election.

Dean also described another incident that showed how Mitchell could throw his political weight around in Washington long after quitting as Attorney General in February 1972 and as head of President Nixon's re-election committee in July 1972. On March 20, 1973, said Dean, Mitchell phoned him to rail against the treatment that he had received at the hands of the New York federal grand jury poking into the circumstances of Vesco's campaign contributions. Declared Dean: "He said that he had had a hell of a grilling, and he said that 'those little bastards were all over me. They asked questions all over the lot and even asked questions about John Ehrlichman and about you.' Mr. Mitchell asked me, he said, 'John, you'd better call your friend Dick Kleindienst [the Attorney General] and tell him what's going on.' " Dean dutifully passed along the message to Kleindienst. What happened next remains unclear, but the grand jury went on to indict Mitchell and Stans in May 1973.

As part of its crossexamination, the defense introduced portions of the White House tapes, the first time they have been used at a trial. Peter Fleming, Mitchell's top attorney, produced a transcript of a taped conversation between Dean and Nixon on the day that Mitchell had called to complain about the grand jury. Although Dean told the President about Mitchell's anger, the tapes showed that he did not report he had been asked to call Kleindienst. This apparent lack of candor was pounced upon by Fleming, who got Dean to admit that the conversation had occurred at a time when, by his own claim, he was telling Nixon "all the truth"--an allusion to his revelations to the President about Watergate. Dean's acknowledgment of the omission was a minor victory for the defense in its attempt to impugn his credibility.

Referring to the same tape, Walter Bonner, the head of Stans' legal team, then got Dean to admit that he had told the President that no one in the White House had ever done anything to help Vesco. At the time, of course, Dean had tried--though unsuccessfully--to delay the Vesco subpoenas.

Key Witness. On Feb. 28,1973, the day after the SEC made public Vesco's $200,000 contribution, Dean told the President, according to a tape, "We have a good strong case" that the money had been given legally. Indeed, the tapes show that Dean had joined with the President in paying a tribute to Stans that sounded like a parody of Gilbert and Sullivan.

Nixon: Stans would never do a thing like that, never...

Dean: No, never.

Nixon: Never, never.

Though the defense was able to catch Dean in several inconsistencies, the young lawyer on the whole maintained his poise just as he had at Sam Ervin's committee hearings before the television cameras. On the basis of his performance last week, Dean passed his first major test as a witness under fire in a courtroom. He is expected to testify this month at the perjury trial of Dwight Chapin, the former appointments secretary for the President, and at the September trial of the seven former Nixon aides, including Mitchell, charged with covering up the Watergate burglary. In addition, of course, Dean could be a key witness in any impeachment proceeding against the President.

When Dean stepped down, his place was taken by Brad Cook, a bald, serious-faced, ambitious man who looks older than his 36 years. As the general counsel of the SEC, Cook had been put in charge of the investigation of Vesco, a man he characterized in court as "somebody you wouldn't want to do business with." To Cook (Phillips/Exeter, Stanford, University of Nebraska Law School), Vesco was "a slimer."

Goose Hunt. A few days after the election, Cook's father--a wealthy Nebraska insurance executive who was active in the G.O.P.--set up a goose hunt in Eagle Lake, Texas, allowing his son to hobnob with such G.O.P. luminaries as Stans and Herbert Kalmbach, then Nixon's personal lawyer. Cook testified that while sitting in a rice field, he had used the occasion to hint very broadly to Stans that he would like to have the older man's backing when he tried to win the job of chairman of the SEC after Bill Casey's anticipated departure. At the same time, Cook said, he mentioned to Stans that as part of the investigation into Vesco's affairs, the SEC was trying to trace what had happened to $250,000 that seemed to have disappeared. Cook testified that he told Stans that he understood Vesco may have given $50,000 to the Nixon re-election campaign.

The way Cook told it, the reference to Vesco drew a defensive reaction from Stans. At the time, Vesco's $200,000 contribution had not yet been disclosed, but the financier's $50,000 gift to the campaign was a matter of public record. Even so, Stans told Cook that he did not think that "they" had taken any money from Vesco at all.

When the SEC drafted its charges against Vesco, the document noted that the financier had refused to say where the $250,000 had gone. According to Cook, Stans was worried about even this vague reference and implied that Cook should eliminate any mention of the sum from the final SEC complaint. Cook said that he complied with Stans' request. On Nov. 27, 1972, without referring to the $250,000, the SEC charged Vesco and a number of his associates with committing a $224 million stock fraud by illegally manipulating their foreign-based mutual funds.

On March 3, 1973, with Stans' support, Cook gained his goal of succeeding Casey as chairman of the SEC. Four days later, he was seated across a table from Stans in the White House mess. Said Cook: "He looked at me and said, 'Brad, let's have one of those conversations that doesn't take place.' "

According to Cook, Stans then said he had lied to the grand jury by saying that he had never discussed Vesco with Cook until after the SEC complaint was filed. Said Cook: "I looked at Mr. Stans, or actually I looked into my coffee cup, and I said, 'Well,' and I kind of hesitated, and he said, 'Well, Brad, that's the way it happened, and there is no sense in getting everybody embarrassed here. There was nothing done wrong here. The gift was a legal gift. Your suit was brought, and all it would do is cause a great deal of embarrassment to everybody.' I said, 'Well, if that's the way it is going to be, I guess that's the way it is going to be.' "

"Not Lying Now." During his direct testimony, Cook acknowledged that he had lied about his relationship with Stans on the Vesco matter during two appearances before the grand jury and one before a congressional committee. But Cook said that he changed his mind as the investigations closed in. On May 7, 1973, Cook testified, he told Stans, "I'm going to tell it like it was." Then he went back to New York City to testify a third time before the grand jury. When the indictment was handed up on May 10, 1973, Stans was accused of inducing Cook to remove all references to the $250,000 from the SEC complaint. Six days later, as news of his questionable role in the Vesco case became public, Cook resigned--after just ten weeks as SEC chairman.

When Cook was brought under crossexamination, the strong case that he had built against Stans began to weaken. Bonner got Cook to admit that he had lied about the Vesco affair to various authorities not three times, as he had testified, but seven--including four times after he had told Stans he was going to tell the truth. The defense drew from Cook the admission that he had not been indicted for any of his perjuries. Asked by Fleming if he was not lying in court to save himself from prosecution by the Government, Cook said: "I am not lying now."

Cook also admitted he had told a congressional committee that he decided to change the paragraph in the Vesco complaint the day before Stans called him to suggest a switch. Further, Cook acknowledged that he had brought up the matter of Vesco's mysterious $250,000 three times to Stans. Why should Cook have done that? The defense left the implication that Cook had been trying to use the Vesco affair to try to pressure Stans into supporting him for the top job at the SEC.

After starting with a bang, Cook left the jury to decide whether or not he was lying for the eighth time. This week the prosecution expects to complete its case. Then the defense will begin, and John Mitchell and Maurice Stans will fight the charges of Cook, Dean and the U.S. Government.

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