Deep Throat led FBI probe into source of leaks

MARK FELT, the former FBI official who unmasked himself as the legendary Deep Throat source who leaked Watergate secrets, twice led FBI probes into finding Deep Throat.

Combing through originally confidential FBI files now available to the public, The Nation magazine reporters David Corn and Jeff Goldberg found documents that showed Mr Felt was in charge of finding the source of Bob Woodward’s and Carl Bernstein’s Washington Post scoops that helped bring down President Richard Nixon.

How Deep Throat Fooled the FBI, which shows how Mr Felt threw the federal agency off his trail, will hit newsstands on June 23 and was posted on the magazine’s website on Monday.

“He was much more than a secret sharer. He was an operator,” says the story, adding he: “Was able to watch his own back and protect his ability to guide the two reporters.”

Mr Felt, filling in for FBI Acting Director L Patrick Gray in June 1972 yet already talking secretly with Mr Woodward, cleverly ordered an investigation of whether any FBI official had leaked information to the Washington Daily News. Not surprisingly, that inquiry produced nothing.

Even after suspicion grew in the White House that Mr Felt might be the source of leaks, he was again put on the case. In February 1973, he was assigned to another probe into the Post’s sources. He concluded: “There is no question that they have access to sources either in the FBI or in the Department of Justice.”