Transcript

Operation Golden Rod: The FBI’s Secret High-Seas Arrest | The FBI Files

From The FBI Files · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 2 h 28 min · 19,943 words · 442 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Operation Golden Rod: The FBI’s Secret High-Seas Arrest | The FBI Files", an episode of The FBI Files published January 3, 2026 (2 h 28 min, about 19,943 words). It mentions 14 people, works and ideas, including FBI, Tom Hansen, FALN, Lebanon, Hezbollah.

What this episode is about

In June 1985, armed extremists hijack Royal Jordanian Air Flight 402 en route from Beirut to Amman, targeting American interests amidst rising global terrorism. The FBI and CIA coordinate a risky operation to apprehend the hijackers, showcasing their expanded authority in the fight against international terrorism and sending a strong message to radical groups.

Key takeaways

  • In the escalating war on terror, hijacked planes became disturbing stages for political performances.
  • The 1980s marked America's awakening to global terrorism, long before 9/11 shifted the narrative.
  • When terrorists forcefully reshape reality, sometimes deception becomes a hero's ally in dire situations.
  • Beirut's 30-hour ordeal illustrates how desperation can turn captors into casualties in a game of brinkmanship.
  • America's clandestine operations respond to threats, showing that national security can be more than just muscle.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 15:00: Lebanon, Tom Hansen, Hezbollah, Beirut International Airport
  2. – 30:00: Lebanon, Tom Hansen, Hezbollah, Oliver Buck Rall
  3. – 45:00: Operation Golden Rod, Tom Hansen, Lebanon
  4. – 1:00:00: Lebanon
  5. – 1:45:00: Jim Calstrom
  6. – 2:00:00: Thomas Manning
  7. – 2:15:00: Thomas Manning, Operation Western Sweep
  8. – 2:27:40: Thomas Manning

Notable quotes from "Operation Golden Rod: The FBI’s Secret High-Seas Arrest | The FBI Files"

  • Government responded with new laws. laws that gave the FBI broader powers to go after these radical extremists. This is the story of one of the FBI's first cases in the war on terrorism. A war that started long before September 11th.
    about Jim Calstrom · at
  • Former member of the FBI's International Terrorism Squad, Special Agent Tom Hansen.
    about Tom Hansen · at
  • The situation further deteriorates, eventually forcing the US Marines to deploy to Lebanon as part of a multinational peacekeeping force.
    about Lebanon · at
  • The most notorious of these groups is Hezbollah, whom US intelligence agencies suspect is behind the Marine barracks bombing.
    about Hezbollah · at
  • The FBI knows the two most active terrorist groups in Beirut are Hezbollah and the Amal militia, another Shia faction formed during the civil war.
    about FBI · at
  • Call in the bureau vehicle from Ed Me, the attorney general, and he advised me. He said, Buck, I just briefed President Reagan. It's a go. Good luck and I'll talk to you on the other end.
    about Oliver Buck Rall · at
  • September 1987, Operation Golden Rod is a go.
    about Operation Golden Rod · at
  • A terrorist group called the FALN detonates a series of bombs all over New York City.
    about FALN · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Tom Hansen — Person · Referenced expert / key investigator · 8 mentions · first at
    Quoted repeatedly as the FBI Special Agent who led the Flight 402 hijacking investigation and explains operational/legal constraints and investigative steps.
  • Jim Calstrom — Person · Narrator / referenced expert (former FBI leader) · 2 mentions · first at
    Introduces and frames multiple segments as a former head of the FBI's New York office, providing historical context on terrorism cases and FBI response.
  • Oliver Buck Rall — Person · Referenced expert / senior FBI official · 2 mentions · first at
    Provides high-level FBI perspective on terrorism policy, interagency coordination (OSG), and the strategic intent behind overseas arrest/prosecution operations.
  • Chadley Khalibi — Person · Referenced political figure (demand target) · 1 mention · first at
    Named as the Arab League chairman whom hijackers sought to meet; serves as a key demand/pressure point in the Flight 402 hijacking narrative.
    Unable to force a meeting with Arab League chairman Chadley Khalibi. The hijacker reads his statement to the control tower.
  • Thomas Manning — Person · Referenced subject (likely suspect/actor outside provided excerpt) · 11 mentions · first at
    Appears in the entity list but is not clearly present in the provided transcript segment; cannot be reliably disambiguated or enriched without additional episode context.
    In 1987, Thomas Manning and Richard Williams stand trial in Somerville, New Jersey.

Companies & orgs

  • FBI — Company · Law enforcement agency · 4 mentions
    Primary law enforcement agency involved in counterterrorism operations and investigations mentioned in the podcast.

Concepts & topics

  • FALN — Concept · Terrorist group · 4 mentions
    A Puerto Rican terrorist group responsible for a series of bombings in the US during the 1970s and 1980s.
  • Hezbollah — Concept · Terrorist group · 5 mentions · first at
    A radical Shiite Muslim group involved in terrorist activities in Lebanon during the 1980s.

Places & events

  • Lebanon — Place · Setting · 18 mentions · first at
    Primary location where many of the terrorist activities and counterterrorism operations took place.
  • Royal Jordanian Air Flight 402 — Event · Hijacking incident · 4 mentions
    A hijacking incident in 1985 that was one of the FBI's first cases in the war on terrorism.
    The actual investigation regarding the hijacking of Royal Jordanian 402 started off as a basic intelligence effort to gather as much information as.
  • Beirut International Airport — Place · Setting · 3 mentions · first at
    Key location for several terrorist incidents, including hijackings and bombings.
    The bombing at the Marine barracks is the single deadliest attack on Americans overseas.
  • Operation Golden Rod — Event · Counterterrorism operation · 2 mentions · first at
    A successful operation to capture a hijacker involved in the Royal Jordanian Air Flight 402 incident.
  • USS Saratoga — Place · Military asset · 4 mentions
    US Navy aircraft carrier involved in the Operation Golden Rod mission.
    The but immediately headed west in the Mediterranean to link up with the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga.
  • Operation Western Sweep — Event · Counterterrorism operation · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as part of the US government's efforts to combat terrorism in the 1980s.
    In 1984, the FBI launches Operation Western Sweep, a mission to apprehend three key members of a violent radical group.

Full transcript with timestamps

In Beirut, armed extremists seize a plane to make a political statement. They terrorize the crew of passengers, including two US citizens as attacks increase against Americans abroad. The FBI and the CIA undertake a daring operation to arrest a hijacker and to send a powerful message to terrorists everywhere. Heat.

Heat. In the 1980s, the United States faced a deadly new enemy abroad. An expanding network of terrorists targeting American interests. Hundreds of innocent people were killed in bombings, executions, and hijackings. I'm Jim Calstrom, former head of the FBI's New York office. As the violence escalated, the US government responded with new laws. laws that gave the FBI broader powers to go after these radical extremists. This is the story of one of the FBI's first cases in the war on terrorism. A war that started long before September 11th.

Hi there. How are you doing today? Thank you. 14. Enjoy your flight. June 11th, 1985.

128. Hi there. 66 passengers, including an American university professor and his son, board Royal Jordanian Air Flight 402 from Beirut, Lebanon to Aman, Jordan.

You came from over there. A gang of heavily armed terrorists overpowers the passengers and crew. They force flight attendants to identify undercover sky marshals to prevent them from intervening. The

lead hijacker forces his way into the cockpit and orders the crew to take off. Once in the air, he demands that the captain fly to Tunis. The captain does not speak Arabic.

His co-pilot translates. The hijacker wants to force a meeting with the Lebanese ambassador and the chairman of the Arab League, Chadlay Khalibi. The goal to make demands, including the removal of 20,000 Palestinians from Lebanon. As the plane flies toward Tunis, the terrorists beat and torture the sky marshals. They appear to have complete control until the aircraft finally enters Tunisian airspace. former member of the FBI's International Terrorism Squad, Special Agent Tom Hansen.

They were denied landing uh authority and in fact uh the Tunisian authorities blocked the runways with fuel and water trucks. The main hijacker had conversations over the aircraft radio with the tower. Uh this went back and forth for an extended period of time and he was simply unable to break the Tunisian will to allow the aircraft to land.

Unable to force a meeting with Arab League chairman Chadley Khalibi. The hijacker reads his statement to the control tower. The aircraft continues to circle the Tunis airport, becoming dangerously low on fuel.

The pilot convinces the lead hijacker that to avoid crashing, they must fly to Palmo, Italy to refueling dangerous fuel. We're going to land in Palmo. Flight 402 approaches the Italian airport, but the captain cannot land. The runways there are also blocked.

He informs the air traffic control that they must either allow the plane to land or clean up the wreckage.

The tower finally complies. till once they are on the ground, the hijackers demand that the plane be refueled.

Airport authorities at Polarmo refused. The Italians stole for time with a simple deception. They notified the flight deck that they had u they had notified the Arab League and that they were making all attempts and felt confident that they could get Chadley Khibi to travel from Tunis to Polarmo to meet with the hijackers.

The hijacker is suspicious. Why would Chadley Khalivi travel to Polarmo when he refused to meet him at Tunis airport? After an hour of waiting,

the hijacker tells the tower that he will throw two children from the plane if airport authorities do not send out a refueling truck.

Okay, okay, okay. 10 minutes later, flight 402 is refueled and heading back to Tunis. For the second time in one day, the plane circles above Tunis International Airport.

The captain tells the tower that the hijacker wants to read his statement on Tunisian radio, a staterun network. The air traffic controller responds that they cannot patch him through. They don't have the equipment.

Listen, he doesn't even speak English. Okay. To appease the hijacker, the captain lies to him and tells him the tower has agreed to broadcast his statement.

Flight 402 returns to Beirut International Airport. Another terrorist boards the plane. He orders a few children and elderly passengers to leave.

He relays a message from the superior instructing the lead hijacker to fly over Jordan and Syria to read their proclamation. The plane again takes off, but after spending more than 24 hours in the air, the lead hijacker decides to turn back.

He did not feel that they were getting a bang for their buck, so to speak. So, the aircraft never went to Jordan and never went to Syria.

The aircraft circles Lebanon for several hours before finally landing in Beirut. Determined to get their message across, the hijackers rigged the nose of the aircraft with plastic explosives. At 9:00 a.m., the lead hijacker calls the tower.

He vows that if 20,000 Palestinian refugees are not expelled from Lebanon by 2:00 that afternoon,

he will kill the remaining hostages. in Beirut. Gunmen rigged the cockpit of a hijacked plane with explosives.

Aboard are 66 passengers, including two United States citizens and nine crew members. The hijackers tell the tower that they will kill all the hostages if the government does not expel more than 20,000 Palestinians from Lebanon by 2 p.m.

FBI special agent Tom Hansen. Without any real notice, the passengers were ordered off the aircraft and instructed to uh enter into the terminal building. Inexplicably, their 30-hour nightmare is over. The hijackers place hand grenades around the cabin. With the aircraft emptied, and in the presence of international media, the hostage takers deliver one more emphatic statement.

US federal law enforcement agencies are determined to catch the hijackers. For the FBI, it is an historic moment. For the first time, they can legally pursue terrorists who have attacked Americans overseas, a power they had only recently acquired. In the early 1980s, Lebanon was a country ravaged by civil war. With the central government in shambles, Christian and Muslim militias clash, fighting for control, Beirut, once considered the Paris of the Middle East, is reduced to rubble.

The situation further deteriorates, eventually forcing the US Marines to deploy to Lebanon as part of a multinational peacekeeping force. The violence only escalates. In October of 1983, a suicide bomber detonates a truck full of explosives at the Marine barracks at Beirut International Airport. The blast kills 241 US servicemen. 3 seconds later, a similar bomb destroys the French Army barracks, killing 58. The bombing at the Marine barracks is the single deadliest attack on Americans overseas. Former FBI assistant director of the Criminal Investigation Division, Oliver Buck Rall. The uh horrendous attack upon the Marine barracks in ' 83 uh for a short time really focused the attention of the American public on terrorism, but it always wandered off very quickly because there was not a belief of there being a sustained level of attack against the United States.

Many Americans are unaware that several radical Shiite Muslim groups have declared a low inensity war on the US. Their goal to drive Westerners out of Lebanon. The most notorious of these groups is Hezbollah, whom US intelligence agencies suspect is behind the Marine barracks bombing. The following year, terrorism continues to plague the region. Diplomacy has failed. Peacekeeping forces have proven ineffective. and the FBI only has the legal authority to monitor international terrorism. Special Agent Tom Hansen.

We had no real jurisdiction to operate uh overseas or to prosecute those who committed acts outside the borders of the continental United States.

To give US authorities broader international powers, Congress enacts the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984. This new law allows the FBI to apply existing kidnapping and air piracy laws to crimes committed against American citizens overseas.

So from that point on, any terrorist group who took an American hostage anywhere in the world, including aircraft hijackings, became the subject of an FBI investigation. The hijacking of the Royal Jordanian flight uh violated the anti-hostage taking statute that had been passed in 1984 uh for the very first time and it involved the FBI then initiating an investigation. Even though the plane had never been in the United States and it was not a US carrier, there were Americans on board. They were held hostage and therefore the st the statute was violated.

Tom Hansen becomes the lead agent on the case. The actual investigation regarding the hijacking of Royal Jordanian 402 uh started off as a basic intelligence effort to gather as much information as possible. The FBI knows the two most active terrorist groups in Beirut are Hezbollah and the Amal militia, another Shia faction formed during the civil war.

Here is the plane. They suspect it is the Amal militia who is responsible for the hijacking.

They control security at the Beirut airport, giving them access to the plane. Also, the hijackers anti-Palestinian statements are typical of the group.

Former FBI executive assistant director Buck Rall. there was a dichotomy between the Hezbala and and the Amal in that the Amal wanted to remove the Palestinians from the south of Lebanon to um send them back in into Israel or elsewhere. Uh whereas Hezbala uh was supportive of the Palestinian movement, particularly the PLO. Both groups use extreme measures to get their message across. 3 days after the hijacking of flight 402, four Hezbollah gunmen hijacked TWWA flight 847 in Athens and forced the pilot to fly to Beirut.

This was primarily um an American flight. There were over 140 passengers on board, many of them American citizens. The Hezbala made a number of demands uh uh in conjunction with this aircraft hijacking specifically for the release of certain Hezbollah Shia prisoners as well as certain Palestinian prisoners uh demands which of course the United States had no control over. Uh and of course it was against US policy to make concessions to terrorist organizations. The hijackers forced the TWWA jet to fly back and forth between Beirut and Alers.

At each stop, they release women and children. In Beirut, the terrorists decide to prove they are serious about their demands. They kill US Navy diver. They executed him in cold blood, threw him out on the tarmac uh there at Beirut International Airport, which of course enraged all of us and cause us to rededicate ourselves that this wouldn't stand. We would go after these people as long as it took.

39 hostages remain, all Americans. The hijackers move them off the plane and hold them at several locations around Beirut. President Ronald Reagan reacts.

Terrorists, be on notice. We will fight back against you in Lebanon and elsewhere. We will fight back against your cowardly attacks on American citizens and property.

Authorities consider possible diplomatic strategies. There were continuous meetings in the sit room at the White House. We were trying to come up with some basis to affect the release of the hostages. This was probably the most stressful circumstance during my 12 years in charge of the terrorism program. We were using every intelligence means available to us. CIA assets, technical means, intelligence from allied services uh through diplomatic channels. It was an allout effort to obtain any and all information about who was holding the hostages, where they were being held, under what circumstances, and of course any information that would allow us to locate and potentially rescue the hostages.

As US agencies gather intelligence, you can take them with you. 39 American lives hang in the balance. June 1985, Hezbollah gunman hijacked TWWA flight 847 in Athens and forced the pilot to fly to Lebanon. They hold 39 passengers hostage all over Beirut. The US Department of State applies diplomatic pressure trying to secure the release of the hostages. former FBI executive assistant director Buck Rebell.

We were putting pressure on the Syrians, pressure on the existing Lebanese government. We were using surrogates such as Egypt uh and and Jordan. So, it was really an all-out effort to use any and everyone that might have some ability to try and bring pressure on the uh the Hezbala to release the prisoners. Finally, President Hafz al-Assad of Syria offers to negotiate with the captives and convinces them to release all 39 hostages. President Ronald Reagan gives voice to the nation's collective sense of relief. The 39 Americans held hostage for 17 days by terrorists in Lebanon are free, safe, and at this moment on their way to Frankfurt, Germany. They'll be home again soon. This is a moment of joy for them, for their loved ones, and for our nation.

With the hostages safe, US authorities turn their attention to finding the hijackers. FBI agents debrief the hostages of TWWA Flight 847. Special Agent Tom Hansen. Many of the passengers were shown um photo spreads of previous uh suspects and hijackings, kidnappings to determine whether or not any of these individuals were involved in the TWWA uh incident. Many of the passengers identified the photo that we had of the main hijacker from the Royal Jordanian aircraft. Hansen learns that the lead hijacker of Royal Jordanian Airflight 402, a member of the Amal militia guarded hostages from the TWWA hijacking.

They gave accounts of conversations with this individual who admitted that he was one of the Royal Jordanian hijackers and asked them if they had seen the aircraft and uh basically bragged about his his role in that incident. He was the main

investigators have identified a prosecutable subject, but gathering information on a Beirutbased terrorist is difficult at best. At the time, a boundary called the Green Line divides Beirut into the Christian East and the Muslim West. Dwayne Dwey Clarage is a former division chief in the Central Intelligence Agency's Directorate of Operations. West Beirut was no man's land for Americans or even for many Lebanese and therefore collecting information was extremely difficult not only for for CIA but also for the friendly Lebanese intelligence services.

But the CIA is relentless. Embedded operatives in Beirut continue interviewing informants. Their persistence pays off.

They learn where the Royal Jordanian air hijacking suspect lives. The only problem, US authorities are powerless to go after him.

It just wasn't possible to coordinate with the Lebanese authorities to hand over hand over the main subject. There there was no specific government really in control.

Terrorism continues to spread throughout the world. In 1985 alone, there are 812 incidents of international terrorism. 926 people are killed, including 23 Americans. We had so many acts of terrorism committed against US citizens abroad uh that the president convened a task force. The vice president's task force on combating terrorism brought in cabinet level people to examine the law, the policy and the actions of the United States to best combat terrorism and to define the roles of the various agencies. So that was very clear and they set up means for inter agency coordination

in January 1986. The task force creates the operation subgroup or OSG like to be meeting you somewhere else under different circumstances but terrorism.

This inter agency panel is comprised of officials from the FBI, the CIA, the National Security Agency, the Department of Defense, the Department of Justice and the State Department. Buck Rell represents the FBI.

The OSG had two responsibilities. One to ensure that appropriate intelligence was disseminated at on a full basis and secondly to coordinate operations against uh terrorist targets whether they be uh groups or organizations or even terrorist sponsoring nations.

Representing the CIA on the OSG is Duey Clarage. Even before the creation of the OSG, Clarage had made recommendations for improving the CIA's counterterrorism operations. We had to do something very different because terrorism is a transnational phenomenon. By what I mean by that is that an operation may be planned by a group in Syria but carried out in Rome. Now, US government, like all all governments, is organized on geographic lines, no matter what a agency you're talking about, [snorts] and it inhibits really getting after the terrorists. To handle that, you would create a center where the center would operate across national boundaries or across the divisional boundaries of CIA.

The solution, at least for CIA, was to create the counterterrorism center to deal with a transnational problem both in terms of geography and bureaucratic turf.

The CTC unites operatives from each of the AY's divisions, enabling them to pull intelligence. Julie Clarage is named chief of the center.

It was a revolution. Never before had CIA ever organized across geographic boundaries or bureaucratic geographic boundaries on anything.

This afternoon, the US is now in a position to take action against the terrorist threat and the OSG is at the center of the effort.

We were looking for a target which would do several things for us. One, we wanted to demonstrate to the terrorists in the Middle East that we had the will and the capability of going after them anywhere at any time. Second, we wanted to demonstrate the effectiveness of the new law and to have it tested in the courts. So, we were looking for proactive opportunities to uh essentially put on on notice that the United States was not going to be dormant. It was going to be proactive in addressing these problems. Members of the OSG sift through intelligence on several wanted terrorists, including the hijackers of Royal Jordanian Airflight 402 and TWWA Flight 847.

All right, you got something. The problem is none of the potential targets are accessible.

That's kind of tough place to get into, but I assure you for now all the CIA and the FBI can do is gather information on the wanted terrorists and work to get indictments.

Special Agent Tom Hansen. As most investigations go, there there has to be an element of luck. And ours came in uh in June of 1987. The OSG learns that the drug enforcement agency already has a Lebanese informant working out of Cyprus. Because of his associations, they believe he could help them locate wanted terrorists. In debriefing him, a CA operative learns the informant knows the lead hijacker of Royal Jordanian Airflight 402. US authorities may finally have the means to capture him. In the 1980s, with the growing threat of violence against Americans abroad, the US government makes international terrorism a top priority.

In 1986, the operation subgroup or OSG learns that a DEA informant knows the lead hijacker of Royal Jordanian Airflight 402. FBI special agent Tom Hansen. Not only did he know the main hijacker, but they had shared a friendship and an association over a period of approximately four years. in fact indicated that he felt that he could get this person to travel outside of Lebanon and visit him in another country. And this gave us um one thing that we hadn't had in the past and that was accessibility.

Former chief of the CIA's counterterrorist center and OSG member Dwey Clarage. By getting our hands on him and bringing him back to the states and put him on trial, we would be signaling to the terrorists for the first time that we had changed our method of operation and we're on the offensive.

The informant is cooperating, but he has a few concerns. I don't know. I know that you

former FBI executive assistant Buck Rall. He wanted a significant uh reward and relocation of himself and his family to the United States under the witness protection program. Uh we felt uh in in the inter agency u uh negotiations that this was a reasonable request. He certainly would be at risk if he and his family stayed in Lebanon. Uh so um we obtained authority to do that.

In Cyprus, the informant tells a CIA operative that the hijacker has left the Amal militia.

The hijacker had in fact uh got into the drug business. He pursued this in Europe and uh other u parts of the uh Mediterranean. So was somewhat actively involved in transportation and sale of narcotics. He told us that the elite hijacker was interested in doing drug deals, that he had been involved in the past in certain drug operations, and he thought that he could be enticed to leave Lebanon, which was an important issue, uh, and go to Cyprus or elsewhere where he would be vulnerable for arrest on our charges.

The OSG now believes the Royal Jordanian air hijacker is within reach. stronger. We want to make sure we're not.

With the informant's cooperation, the CIA plants listening devices in his home to record his conversations with the hijacker.

The determination was for him to go back and say, "I know of a major international drug dealer who is looking to do an operation. uh you could bring the drugs in through uh uh Iran into Lebanon and then uh set up an operation to supply this drug dealer and it would be very lucrative.

The plan calls for the informant to set up a meeting outside Lebanon between the hijacker and an imaginary drug dealer named Joseph. The OSG decides the meeting will take place on a yacht in international waters. I'm

not coming. We did not want any operation that we undertook to involve violations of the sovereignty of another nation.

The OSG considers whether the US military or the FBI should make the arrest. I have good news for you. She just handed me a memo.

Former commander of the FBI's hostage rescue team, Special Agent David Woody Johnson. The basic plan was that any any counterterrorism operation that occurred outside the United States or its territories would be handled by the military. Anything that occurred inside the United States or its territories, HRT would handle. And so now we got a situation where we we may want to go over and grab a guy overseas. Do you use the military teams or do you use HRT? And now it had to have been debated at the at the attorney general, Department of Defense level.

And they finally described it as an arrest. So we're going to use the hostage rescue team in spite of the fact that we're going to do it overseas.

They choose the HRT because the FBI has arrest powers and the military does not. Members of the HRT are law enforcement officers trained to do hostage rescue and testify in a US court of law.

The idea was to try to take him alive and bring him back here and prosecute him. So I think, you know, the idea was to make a bigger political statement and his family. We wanted to make sure that uh the terrorist groups and organizations particularly terrorist sponsoring nations knew that the United States had both legal authority and the will to carry out whatever operations were necessary and we knew that it had to be done with inter agency cooperation. This operation took a very long time to plan. We didn't want to violate the sovereignty of another nation. We did not want to undertake this and not succeed. That would send exactly the wrong message.

The plan is ready to implement. The final hurdle is obtaining the president's approval.

As I was going to Washington National Airport to uh catch a commercial flight uh under just a p regular passport uh to Athens. I received a telephone call in the bureau vehicle from Ed Me, the attorney general,

and he advised me. He said, "Buck, I just briefed President Reagan. It's a go. Good luck and uh I'll talk to you on the other end.

Okay. Yeah, I'll keep you posted. Before launching the mission, the FBI solidifies their case. We had to recont the witnesses that we had previously uh interviewed and determine whether or not we could get a commitment from them that they would come to the United States and testify.

Several passengers and crew of flight 402 agree to take the stand if necessary.

Some of these people the government now has a prosecutable case. The plan dubbed Operation Golden Rod is set into motion.

In the mid 1980s, the US Congress acts to give federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies broader powers to battle the growing threat of international terrorism. September 1987, Operation Golden Rod is a go. The FBI, the CIA, and the US Navy deploy assets for the arrest of the Royal Jordanian Air Hijacker. The FBI coordinates their portion of the operation from a command center aboard the USS positioned in international waters 15 miles off the coast of Cyprus. Special Agent Woody Johnson is the commander of the FBI's hostage rescue team.

The crew was told that they were just waiting for technical support to come out on the ship to help them correct some problems. We came off carrying gun cases and and other things. And we have some pretty big agents and they don't look like normal technicians. And those don't look like normal, no technical boxes.

I remember having one of these young sailors say something that went by said technicians right?

In Greece, HRT member, Special Agent Don Glasser, rents the yacht where the arrest will take place.

Boat was chosen because it wouldn't blend in. it wouldn't wouldn't attract any attention. We made some changes to it. We actually put a satellite navigation system in and making some adjust that and put actually put a luran on it and um it's a electron electronic navigation equipment

in the port town of Lima, Cypress. Julie Clarage and the CIA team set up a command post in a hotel room.

We had a communications officer with us and a lot of aluminum trunks of equipment. which were passed off as photographic gear and we had uh uh satellite communications back to Washington to Yukcom at Stuttgot. Uh that's the US mil military command at Stoutgot. Uh and of course we had communications with the but with the with the yacht and uh headquarters was patching uh our communications through to the FBI headquarters, the White House and whoever else. Everybody wanted to be in on this know what was going on.

Under sail off the coast of Greece, the FBI arrest team alters the appearance of the yacht to protect the owner's identity. They got the name.

We changed the flag from a Grecian flag to a uh to Italian flag. We've changed the home port and the name on the hall and we turned the uh life preservers all around which had the name of the boat on it.

Former FBI executive assistant director Buck Revel oversees the bureau's command center on the USS but

we had emergency response team. We had a helicopter turning up on the uh deck on the aft deck ready to immediately respond with uh automatic weapons and uh other capabilities to defend against any uh attempt by pirates or terrorist groups to intercede in the operation. Our concerns over the actual execution were uh that we could get him uh to the location in international waters to actually execute the arrest, but also that we could secure that arrest, that we could keep it from becoming an international incident.

In these type circumstances, you never know exactly what you're going to be faced with. We were dealing with a very fluid situation in Lebanon. We had to have the CIA operations in place u in in Cyprus. We had to have the FBI operations in place on board the yacht which was the intercept vessel and our our command and control and emergency response on board the USS but which was going to have to stay in international waters but be very close by. And since we couldn't control the exact timetable it had to be very flexible.

FBI and the CIA are ready. CIA operatives tell the informant to call the hijacker in Beirut and tell him everything is in place.

He needs to come to Cypress now to meet the fictitious drug dealer, Joseph. their own business here as long as you like my friend.

The hijack uh bought into this idea of uh coming to Cyprus to meet uh Joseph who we uh you know who we um you know basically manufactured as a as a big drug person. hijacking aircraft isn't, you know, doesn't really make you much money, if any,

but uh and so he was looking to make some money. The hijacker arrives at the informant's home where he will stay until the operation begins.

Welcome to my home. We made sure that not only did he throw money around uh quite lavishly when he brought the hijacker over to Cyprus, but he had showed him a suitcase uh full of money uh that uh certainly impressed the hijacker.

He got the hijacker to uh state on tape that he indeed was the chief hijacker of the Jordanian aircraft. This is something Justice Department wanted very much. The good news was that uh the target, the hijacker was in on Cyprus on schedule.

But the bad news was that we had learned that the Criate Police were looking for him because somehow he had begotten on a watch list of undesirabs.

Um our demo was running around Cypress with a warrant on him. Operatives cannot afford to have local police arrest the hijacker in the middle of the operation.

The CIA decides to have the informant move himself and the hijacker into the same hotel where they have the command center set up.

I felt we could take that risk because it was a weekend and it was unlikely that the police would energize themselves. uh to run around particularly to a highass hotel and a new one at that searching for this fellow.

On Sunday morning, the informant tells the hijacker it's time to meet Joseph. He explains that since the drug dealer can't come to Cyprus, they need to meet him aboard his yacht. informant's brother will take them to him in his boat.

We had to have quote American eyes, US eyes on the target, on the hijacker when he boarded the boat to be to be able to tell Washington with absolute certainty that it was the target who was boarding the boat. And so one of our officers was located on the pier,

Special Agent Tom Hansen. We uh both departed with a cooperating witness and the main subject on time and headed out towards the yacht.

Copy that. They're away. We informed everybody on the uh communications net of that fact and that the operation was underway. Um we are that also uh we ask for Washington to begin to implement the extraction of his relatives uh in near relatives, sisters, brothers and children from various places around the Middle East which had been part of the deal.

Yeah. All right. We had a picketboat system in place to act as guideposts for the for the cooperating witness to navigate from

FBI's hostage rescue team commander special agent Woody Johnson. My job is to worry about the people that are working for me and it's the concern that this is a double cross. Have they set us up? Is he, you know, going along with this thing? But they they're sitting in a boat somewhere waiting on us and then they're going to come charging in on us in the yacht and we're going to end up in a in a fight on the water. For now, all the FBI can do is wait. Undercover FBI agents await the arrival of the Royal Jordanian air hijacker in international waters 12 miles off the coast of Cypress.

FBI's hostage rescue team commander, Special Agent Woody Johnson. We prepositioned the HRT guys on the deck, you know, openly there with the appearance that we're bodyguards for for the drug dealer.

Get that fender ready to go over. Also on deck are two female FBI agents to act as diversions and help put the hijacker at ease. The rest of us were secreted in the down below deck with a sniper in the pilot house. In the event somebody shows up that that we didn't expect or that these guys suddenly jump up and have got weapons and start shooting, uh, we can defend ourselves.

Special Agent Don Glasser. Everything looked um normal on our boat. the uh the female agents for waving to him, beckoning him to come aboard the boat.

I keep thinking this is this seems to be too easy. Is this guy have they set us up?

Hey, how are you? The undercover agent um spoke to them in Arab Arabic, told him that uh the boss was um down below in the boat taking a shower and be up shortly. We said, "Well, the owner's going to want the uh want him to be searched for weapons. It would only take a second." We apologize for that, but that was business. And uh he didn't resist that. So, uh the other other agent patted him down, give him a quick pat down for weapons. Didn't find anything on him. Clean. Let's go downstairs. The other agent escorted him back to the uh cockpit area where we um he nodded to me which was the signal that we'd execute the arrest.

HRT operators came up from the cabin. He was very surprised. I'm not sure who he thought we were. He's absolutely terrified. Did not resist us. We put leg irons on them and we called the ship.

Agents, send word of the successful arrest. All right, we're out of here. At that point, we knew that, you know, we'd done what we were supposed to do, deliver the target to the bureau, and so we closed down the uh the uh command post very rapidly, checked out of the hotel.

As soon as the arrest was made, uh we launched a uh a boat from the but is 900t ship, so we're talking big. comes up over the horizon and we came up alongside of it and the captain was was playing patriotic music over a loudspeaker. You could hear it and he was flying a huge American flag off the back of it that point. He's he's telling the crew what's going on and he said, you know, we finally were striking back and you had the opportunity to be a part of it. I tell you one of the things that was it was really a thrill and and uh actually kind of choked me up is when we came up on the deck there probably two 300 of the crew were up on the deck and they were cheering and clapping and it just really was kind of emotional experience.

The but immediately headed west in the Mediterranean to link up with the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga. agents interview the hijacker aboard the but

the debriefing of of the terrorist was very helpful to the US uh intelligence community and getting an overall appreciation and understanding of the dynamics of uh circumstances in in South Lebanon, the relationship between the Amal and and the Hezbala and and the Lebanese government uh and also the involvement of both Syria uh and Iran in that area. We uh transported him to the Saratoga aboard military helicopter. From there, FBI agents transfer the hijacker to an S3 Viking for the long trip to the United States.

During its uh trip back to Washington DC, it had to perform two in-air refuelings. Uh once the once the flight was completed, it it represented the longest uh flight from continuous flight from the uh uh deck of a US carrier uh that the military had ever performed.

After a 13-hour flight, the S3 lands at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. The Flight 402 hijacker is immediately taken to Washington DC for arraignment. In 1989, the hijacker is tried, convicted, and sentenced to 30 years in prison for conspiracy, air piracy, and hostage taking. The U arrest and prosecution was the the first instance of US law bringing an individual into custody overseas, bringing him to the United States and prosecuting in federal court for a crime in which neither he nor the victim nor nor the uh act or circumstance ever touched US territory.

It was our hope that by carrying out such an audacious uh act that we would send a very strong signal to the terrorists that the the game had changed that we would no longer uh be essentially passive but we'd be proactive in pursuing uh them across the entire world if necessary.

Operation Golden Rock was the first success of its kind in the US government's new war on terrorism. A series of explosions rip through New York City, sifting through the wreckage in search of one shred of evidence. The FBI and police are desperate for something to lead them to these ruthless terrorists. But the killers are careful to cover their tracks. As the bombings escalate, the FBI is in a deadly race to stop this murderous group with a dangerous cause.

In the late 70s and early 80s, a legitimate Puerto Rican independence movement took hold in the United States. But a splintered terrorist group known as the FALN was suspected of executing hundreds of bombings in major US cities. I'm Jim Kelstrom, former head of the FBI's New York office. The terrorists were smart, wellorganized, and deadly, and went to great lengths to conceal their identities. Agents were determined to shut them down before they hit again.

New York City, October 26th, 1974. Just after midnight, five explosions rock Manhattan. New York City police officers race to the scenes. The biggest explosion occurs in the financial district. NYPD detective Elmer Toro leads the investigation. One look at the devastation and Toro knows he will be lucky to find any useful evidence. It appears the bombers use dynamite.

The problem with bombings is that most of the evidence disappears at the at the scene. It disappears because how do you trace dynamite? We have no way of tracing uh dynamite. You you can hope for a fingerprint here and there. You can hope for a witness.

Police question everyone in the area, but no one had seen the bomber. The pattern of debris indicates the bomb was placed under a car.

It was put under the engine block and it picked up the car and the engine just flew up in the air. Pieces landed up all the way on the up in the sixth floor. It was a pretty impressive uh bombing. We did realize quickly that we had a serious problem in our hands.

The only solid clue found at the scene is the tattered remains of what appears to be a leather luggage handle. While police continue to process the scene, they get a call from the Associated Press. One of the alleged bombers called the news agency and told them to look at a phone booth near the bomb site. The patrolman is dispatched to the location. There, under the phone, he finds a letter. He takes it to headquarters to study it for leads. The letter is from a group calling themselves the FAN. In Spanish, the initials stand for the Armed Forces for the National Liberation of Puerto Rico.

They are a fringe group with a limited following. The FALN is not even known in Puerto Rico. It's known to the radical, is known to those fighting for independence, but in general, you speak to the average Puerto Rican, and the FLN is totally unknown to them.

The former Spanish colony of Puerto Rico is voluntarily part of the United States. In elections, more than 90% of Puerto Ricans vote to continue to be part of the US, while less than 5% vote for independence. Now, that 5% has turned dangerous. In the letter, the FALN demands that the US abandon Puerto Rico or more bombs will explode.

These are not people that believe in the electoral system. Their objective is to be violent and through fear cause the people to support them.

What began as a bombing investigation is now a terrorist attack. And fighting terrorism is the job of the FBI. The NYPD goes to the bureau. Detective Toro briefs FBI special agent Don Wford on the evidence found at the bombing locations. Two of them.

The evidence show that the device was a dynamite like high explosive. Definitely set off by some kind of detonator because that was that's the only thing that sets off the sticks of dynamite. There were plenty of pieces to show a watch had been used as the timing device and plenty of pieces of a battery showing that the battery had been used to complete the circuit. Pieces of debris shown that this device was in some kind of bag. Several pieces of a handle were found.

It's not much to go on, but it's all the investigators have. They try to find out who made the handle.

Perhaps they can use the information to learn who bought it. This is from the They then turn their attention to the communic.

It demands the US abandon Puerto Rico and release five Puerto Rican terrorists from federal prison. The terrorists have been in prison since the 1950s. Decades earlier on November 1st, 1950, two Puerto Rican gunmen tried to assassinate President Harry Truman and fail. Two Washington DC policemen are badly injured in the gun battle. One policeman as well as one of the terrorists dies. The surviving gunman is sentenced to life in prison. 3 years later, four more pro-independence Puerto Ricans are sent to prison after opening fire in the House of Representatives.

Now, Detective Toro and Agent Wolford theorize friends or family of the five may be behind this new terror group. I was hopeful that working on the background and the current status maybe of those five political prisoners would be some kind of lead.

So we went behind each of those people. We check their mailing list. We check their people who visited them.

At the same time, the NYPD and FBI monitor any Puerto Rican activists who have a history of promoting violence. One month after the bombing, the NYPD gets a call about a dead body in an abandoned building in Spanish Harlem. Rookie NYPD officer Angel Poji on his first day on the job goes to investigate. Officer Poji is of Puerto Rican descent and proud to have become one of New York City's finest. The door was booby trapped and he blasted him right across the street and ended his career on the spot.

Although officer Poji survived the blast, he lost sight in his right eye. When police searched the building, they find no dead body. The phone call was a lie to lure police into a deadly trap. The bomb squad recovers explosive residue and another luggage handle. Like the earlier bombing, they determined this bomb was made of dynamite. From the pattern of the blast damage, they suspect it was probably hung on the back of the door, possibly in a garment bag. Through another phone tip, police recover an FALM communique that proudly claims credit for bombing officer Poji.

For the NYPD, this investigation has become personal. They're fighting for Puerto Rican independence, and the first cup they mutilate is a Puerto Rican kid. A Puerto Rican kid. Because that's all he was. When they get to your house, you sort of react a little bit different. We knew we had a war in our hands. The communicate says the bombing is revenge for the death of an obscure Puerto Rican poet, Martin Tito Perez. If you had put Martin Tito Perez's name out in Spanish Harlem, probably a lot of people might have known who he was, but in the rest of Manhattan and the rest of the United States, of course, nobody would have known who Martin Tito Perez was, except the bomber knew. At this point, we knew we had a Spanish Harlem connection.

A few days earlier, police photographed a Puerto Rican man in Spanish Harlem handing out leaflets accusing the police of murdering Martin Perez in jail. Although Perez's death was officially ruled a suicide, the activist urges violent revenge against the police. His name is William Morales.

William Morales was a very activist person in Spanish Harlem. He was one of the Puerto Rican independence type people who were at any demonstration, any rally or whatever. He was a a player in the Puerto Rican independence movement.

While Morales seems suspicious, police don't have enough to bring him in. They continue their search for anyone who knows anything about the crippling attack on Officer Poi, but come up empty. While the investigation stalls, the FALN set their sights on a historic tavern in the heart of New York's financial district.

The terrorists are raising the stakes for their deadly cause. A terrorist group called the FALN detonates a series of bombs all over New York City. The FBI struggles to piece together the evidence in time to stop the bombers before they strike again. They are fighting a losing battle. Historic Francis Tavern in the financial district is a popular lunch spot for Wall Street brokers. January 24th, a bomb explodes during the lunch rush. The blast kills four people and injures more than 60. The victims are rushed to area hospitals.

FBI special agent Don Woford takes over. It's one of the worst explosive crime scenes I have seen in uh my uh year of career. The entire first floor was nothing but splinters. All of the tables and chairs and walls and everything was just splintered.

Okay, look up here. The first bombs did not kill anyone. The second targeted a single individual. This time, the bombers clearly intended to kill as many people as possible. This was a midday bomb, not 3:00 in the morning. Not a bomb hung in a abandoned tenement, but a bomb put in a active restaurant full of people. It is a scene that FBI special agent Rick Horn will never forget.

The streets were wet, having been hosed down to hose off the blood and and uh damage to the individuals that had been injured or died at the scene. Seeing that scene impacted me in such a way that I really wanted to make sure that we solved those cases. At the sight of the blast, investigators again find a luggage handle similar to the one found at the earlier bombings. Independently, witnesses tell them that a few minutes before the bomb exploded, a suspicious man left a garment bag. He's not dressed to be in Frances Tavern restaurant with with Wall Street brokers at noon. He must have taken a wrong turn. And why is he leaving that bag?

Didn't reach down and turn on any switches. According to all the witnesses, he just dropped it. So that bomb was ticking. That thing was going. And based on the damage it did, it probably had 20 to 30 sticks of dynamite in it. So here's a man walking around Manhattan with a bomb with 20 or 30 sticks of dynamite in it. That takes some dedication.

And uh his hand was part. Witnesses work with a police artist to develop sketches of the suspect. This group was clearly becoming more dangerous and the FBI intensifies their efforts. Look,

I got this sketch on The FBI distributes the sketch all over New York, but investigators can't find anyone who matches the description.

So on these in the lab, technicians review what little physical evidence they have. They turned to the letters left at each of the sites outlining the terrorist group demands.

Their objective was to kill executives from US corporations and they say that right in the communicate. Corporate America is seen in those days as part of the military-industrial complex and as such attacking US corporations is as good as tacking the US government.

Right here. Lab technicians confirmed that all three FALN communicates use the same paper type face and letter head.

It's not much to go on. We found out to our chagrin that the complete communicate, the paper, the ink, the font, the type, the stencil, the logo, and everything could be bought at a million different places in Manhattan.

I think you already did. The luggage handles do provide lab technicians with a promising lead. The garment bags used to hide the bombs are all one particular model made by one manufacturer. To find out where

it could be the break the investigators need. The FBI contacts the manufacturer for a list of every store in the New York area that carries the bags. Over the next few weeks, investigators visit each store and show the sketch. But no one seems to recognize the suspect.

The bombings continue. 3 months after the Francis Tavern bombing, an FALN communicate takes credit for four bombs that explode after midnight in Midtown Manhattan. Then 800 miles away in Chicago, the unimaginable happens. Bombs explode at two banks. and FALN communicate takes credit. The terrorists are now a nationwide threat. In the New York FBI office, investigators compare the Chicago communique with earlier FALN communicates.

We know immediately when we get the communique from the mast head being the same, from the logo being the same that this is in fact our FALN. This gives investigators new angles to pursue.

There's a whole new theory that arises from that and that is that we can't find them in New York because they're really a Chicago based group.

The FBI contacts special agent William Dyson in the Chicago field office. This is the first time Chicago is being involved in this group called the FALN. New York has a very large Puerto Rican population and appeared as though these attacks were going to be strictly in New York. Now Chicago comes new on the scene. So we were really not sure what to do. We're turning to New York saying, "Do you have any leads? Can give us a hint? Where do we go?"

Somehow the FALN must communicate or travel between New York and Chicago. The FBI and police begin re-checking their list of potential suspects. We can look at our New York people and see what kind of Chicago connections they have. Do they travel at to Chicago at all? Do they in turn have visitors from Chicago? Is is the travel the reverse? Are we do we see Chicago people in New York? And then do we have a bombing?

Investigators determined that several of the Puerto Rican activists they had been watching in New York have links to Chicago. We had all of our people that we thought were interest under 24-hour surveillance, but and by that I mean we were sticking with them wherever they went. I would spend weeks and weeks on the street.

We just couldn't get to the next level. Their surveillance is not working and the terror continues.

9 months after the Francis Tavern bombing, bombs again explode in New York. This time the bombs also tear through the financial centers of Chicago and Washington DC. Once again, the FALN takes credit. After the attack, law enforcement in Chicago and corporate security guards respond by searching around their buildings. Outside the corporate headquarters of an oil company, guards discover a suspicious bouquet of flowers linked to FALN

and they find 14 roses, high quality roses like you would give uh for Mother's Day or something of that nature. Within these roses is this bomb.

The Chicago police bomb tech diffuses the bomb. Now, for the first time, investigators will have the opportunity to examine an unexloded FALN bomb, which could provide critical leads. A crime lab technician reads the unique identification numbers on the sticks of dynamite. It is traced to a dam project in New Mexico, but the trail stops there.

No dynamite was reported stolen. When that lead proves to be a dead end, investigators try to trace the bouquet of roses. We've got to go to the florest. Well, it turns out there's something like 800 florist in the Chicago area. We went to every one of them. When I say we, I mean law enforcement. It wasn't just the FBI. We all got together and we all divided up all the florist shops and we went to every one of them. Could not find where those roses came from. Back in New York, the FBI realizes the components of this bomb match the other bombs.

Investigators compile lists of all the stores in the New York City area that sell each of the items.

They find one store that sells everything. We identify a store up in the Bronx that sells the particular types of watches that have been used. It sells the propane tanks. More importantly, it sells the types of bags that have been used to contain the bombs. The FBI theorizes that maybe the bombers got sloppy and bought everything at the same store. How

about that? At the store, investigators show the owner the composite sketch. Couldn't say by name who the person was, but that a person similar in appearance to that person had been at the store, definitely buying a whole series of the bags and a whole series of the batteries.

Investigators believe this could be a major break. They show the store owner photos of possible suspects. She can't positively ID any of them.

But she does agree to help. We did solicit the cooperation of the owner of the store. She allowed us to go in and mark discreetly the bags, the watches, those sorts of things to see whether or not they would be used in a device. These marks might survive the blast and could confirm the items were purchased from her store.

Investigators also established roundthe-clock surveillance and put some type of video.

And when a person bought a bag, we would put a surveillance on that individual and try to identify who this individual was and try to match the composite to the purchaser of the bag. Now the agents will have to wait and see if the terrorists walk into their trap. In New York, a terrorist group called the FALN plants a series of bombs, killing four people and injuring more than 60. Now they've expanded their terror spree to other American cities, including Washington DC and Chicago. The FBI has been struggling to get a lead on the group. They learned that items similar to those used to make the bombs are all sold in a store in the Bronx.

Agents set up surveillance. But after months of watching the store, they find nothing. Perhaps the terrorists have already stockpiled supplies. Or perhaps they have spotted their surveillance and are once again one step ahead of investigators.

Months after the most recent bombing, the case takes a bizarre twist in Chicago. The police there get an odd tip. An informant reports that a man at a garage has been trying to sell sticks of dynamite to street gangs. The responding officer hears hammering and sees a man trying to break open a trunk. Excuse me.

Hey, stand up. Put the hammer down. Now, the officer also spots dynamite. Put your hands up where I can see them.

The man says his friend stole it from an apartment that contains even more explosives.

The FBI rushes to the apartment. Inside they find more than a 100 sticks of dynamite and other bomb- making materials. FBI special agent William Dyson.

So we not only have explosives, but we also have propane tanks. We have a lot of drilled out wristwatches. We even have communicates.

Investigators feel confident they have discovered an FALN bomb factory. We definitely have the FALN. There's no question about it. The problem is who are the people connected with this apartment?

You know who lives there? While the bomb squad renders the building safe, investigators question tenants who say no one lives in the apartment. They say they have seen two people going in and out. The building's owner, Carlos Torres, and his wife.

One of the things that struck us right away was this lack of sophistication here. The idea of having a bomb factory in your own building. The idea of you being the landlord of the building, the person who would have the access to all the vacant apartments, who would have the keys, just is plain stupid.

So now we got two suspects obviously because not only they own the building, but residents say they have access. They've seen them up in this apartment. Investigators search for Carlos Torres, the building's owner, and his wife Haiti, but they have vanished, which reinforces investigators belief that they have finally identified members of the FALN. The FBI systematically hunts for the bomb factory fugitives. They begin with a thorough background investigation. We pretty much follow the normal fugitive procedures and that basically is to try to make a biography on each one of these individuals. Who are they?

Where did they come from? Who are all their relatives? Make a family tree. We make a family tree on these people better than they would make one. We try to find out every person that's related to them in one way, shape, or form.

Agents interview and watch all of their known relatives and friends, but the fugitives have disappeared without a trace. At the same time, the FBI focuses on an odd document found in the bomb factory. It seems all the Chicago FALN suspects belong to the same Latino Church committee. Chicago FBI notifies New York.

We're taking it over really close. FBI special agent Rick Horn. There was a suspicion that the FALN had co-opted this organization, this charitable organization for its own purposes, to use it for travel, to use it for uh funding. Prior to that,

FBI special agent Don Wford reviews records that show the Chicago suspects used church paid tickets to fly to New York before several past bombings. There's lots of travel back and forth financed by the organization because ostensibly it is supposed to be lending and giving grants for people to start neighborhood community type Hispanic activities like uh Spanish Bibles and himnels maybe for a church in a in a Hispanic neighborhood that kind of thing. Investigators also discovered that the church committee includes a familiar face, New York proviolence radical William Morales.

They keep a close watch on Morales and all the members of the church committee, but investigators don't see anything suspicious. They don't have enough probable cause to request wire taps or search warrants.

We've taken a lot of heat. You know, a lot of people were asking, "What are you guys doing?" You know, these people keep keep on blowing up all these boat. What are you guys doing?

6 months later at the mobile oil building near Grand Central Station, a bomb in an employment office kills one person and injures eight.

She came in, she put the umbrella on. The FBI and NYPD arrive and question witnesses.

A woman who takes job applications claims she saw the bomber. She was, you know, I know who left that bomb because I saw her and I talked to her and I cannot believe she a little girl, she kept saying a little girl like that would leave that would leave a bomb in here and blow somebody up. I saw her and that's who left it.

The witness says a woman came in carrying a closed umbrella that seemed unusually heavy.

She knew when she hung that device there, when it went off, somebody was going to get hurt.

That chair right there, please. The suspect took a job application. She scratched quick a name and a and an address. The bomb is clicking right next to her. She wants to get out of there fast.

You better take it. The suspect tried to leave, but the woman wouldn't let her take the application with her.

Minutes later, the bomb went off, decapitating the man next to it. because he absorbed most of the blast. No one else was killed.

I do know that I can recognize her because I saw her and I talked. Investigators asked for the application, hoping the suspect left a fingerprint.

If they could find a print, it would be their first piece of solid evidence to the identity of the bombers. The lab uncovers nothing on the front of the application. But on the back, they find what they had been looking for, a single fingerprint. The fingerprint belongs to Haiti Torres, the wife of Carlos Torres, who owned the recently discovered FALN bomb factory in Chicago. New York City police issue a warrant for her arrest for seconddegree murder. After a grand jury indictment, her husband Carlos is added to the FBI's top 10 fugitive list.

Now that agents have identified their suspects, they must hope for a break that will uncover where the fugitives are hiding before they strike again.

A terror group called the FALN plants bombs in major cities around the country, including New York and Chicago, killing five people and injuring more than 80. In New York, the FBI suspects that William Morales, a proviolence radical, is somehow connected to the group.

But after months of surveillance, investigators haven't seen anything suspicious. The FBI finally asks Morales if he will talk with them.

Surprisingly, he agrees. FBI special agent Don Wford watches through a one-way mirror as Detective Elmer Toro questions Morales about the FALN terrorist group,

but he gives them nothing. Cool. collected, not the least bit uh upset, not intimidated whatsoever. I don't know nothing about nothing about nothing.

Investigators watch for clues to try and determine if it is just an act. My position was he's a player. He's definitely a player.

Maybe he is a minor league player and he doesn't know anything. I don't believe it, but maybe. But he's a player.

All right, thanks for holding in there for me. Investigators continue to suspect Morales. appreciate you coming here today and then

but without more evidence there are legal limits to how far they can go. Two months later, Queens, New York, firefighters respond to an explosion in an apartment and find FALN letterhead. FBI agent Wolford arrives just as paramedics take a badly injured man from the apartment. Agent Wolford believes the man may be an FALN suspect and tries to identify him. But the man's face is badly injured and his hands are nearly blown off.

Inside the bare apartment, investigators find three small pipe bombs. Evidence suggests a fourth pipe bomb exploded while being built, which explains how the man injured his hands. Investigators discover a copying machine and papers printed with the FALN logo. They also find a large stockpile of explosives. Detective Elmer Toro goes to the hospital to try to identify the suspected bomb maker.

The man's hands are so badly injured that police are unable to get fingerprints. Detective Toro tells the man that investigators will learn his identity from evidence at the bomb factory. If

you can see this, he might as well admit his name now. But the man can't speak.

Manuel Rodrigo. I wrote a bunch of names, people that I suspected. Once we got to the name of William Morales, he moved and he agreed without saying who he was, but he basically identified himself. Detective Toro believes they may have captured the FALN's bomb maker. Toro grills him for information about the organization,

but Morales refuses to cooperate. 9 months later, Morales goes on trial for reckless endangerment and possession of dangerous weapons.

Well, Morales didn't fight. Morales claim a prisoner of war status, no defense, uh, which is a dream for the prosecution.

The judge sentences him to 89 years. Police take Morales to the jail ward of Belleview Hospital to be fitted with artificial hands before going to prison. Incredibly, despite police guards in the hallway, he manages to escape. Investigators rushed to Morales's hospital room.

My initial reaction was, "This is just a bad joke. You know, this is just a bad Yeah, right. Sure. Sure he's escaped. How could he escape?"

First off, he's physically unable to escape. And secondly, he's up on the third floor.

There's nothing down there. It's just they don't have him. They find the window bars and mesh cut open.

The mesh had been spread apart not more than 6 to 8 in. Just about like this. I mean that's straight down.

So he had to squeeze through that hole and get out of the mesh. And then how did he get down three floors? And of course coming to mind immediately was he had help. Investigators begin to piece together what happened. Someone must have smuggled in a pair of bolt cutters. William Morales cut himself out from the third floor with his elbows. He just cuz he had no hands.

Investigators believe Morales jumped three floors to the ground where waiting accompllices drove him away.

The FBI and NYPD launch an allout manhunt for Morales and alert the public and police across the country to be on the lookout. But months go by and the manhunt turns up nothing. Then the terrorists strike again. 6 months after Morales's escape, the FALN begins bombing again in New York, Chicago, and San Juan, Puerto Rico. One year after William Morales's escape, just north of Chicago, Evston police respond to reports of an illegally parked van. stolen.

They radio in the license which comes back stolen. That stolen vehicle. Police decide to watch the stolen van to see if anyone comes back.

So, they surveil it. I mean, they could have towed it away, but they surveil it.

A short while later, a man and woman drive up to the van and begin loading it. Police, put your hands up. Let me see your hands. Let me see your hands. Turn around. Face away from me. Stay right where you

police confront the two and find rifles. The suspects have no ID and refuse to speak, leaving police at a loss.

Where do the weapons come from? They came to figure out what nationality they are. So, they bring him in. So, they got those two people.

A few hours later, in the same Chicago suburb, a citizen calls Evston police to complain about a truck parked in a wealthy neighborhood. The woman says people have been coming up to the truck and climbing in the back all morning. Police officer comes out and tries to talk to the driver.

How are y'all doing here in the neighborhood? Why are you here? Well, I'm visiting. Who you visiting? I'm visiting that person over there. Who is that person? Well, I don't know his name and all and first vague type of descriptions.

It all seems very suspicious. You don't know the names at all. The officer glances into the truck and spots the butt of a handgun.

Put your hands now. He knows he's dealing with armed suspects and there may be more of them hiding in the back of the truck. Step out of the vehicle, sir.

Amid a rash of terror bombings, officers in Evston, Illinois, arrest a suspicious couple.

In the back of their truck, police find people with shotguns, handguns, and disguises.

The truck one time. Officers arrest them as well. on a truck. Look, I've got nine photos.

Evston police photograph and fingerprint their prisoners. No, I've got the list. Can you run?

They also check their identification, but they run into a problem. The names on their IDs prove to be false.

Detectives try to interview the suspects, but they refuse to talk. Her name is Wayne.

Sensing they are on to something big, the police call the FBI. FBI special agent William Dyson looks at the prisoners and immediately recognizes one as a major FALN terrorist. I've got his warned post, a top 10 fugitive, and I recognize I mean, this is Gloss.

Agent Dyson also recognizes other prisoners as members of the FALN. It was like looking at this collage that I had above my desk in the office of all these wanted people. So, we have the FAL and we know we have the FAL and we're able to identify enough of them. This is the FALN. The FBI takes a closer look at the false IDs. From past experience, the FBI knows that criminals who use fake ID often include a real address so that it can be used to function in society. agents noticed that several of the IDs have the same Chicago address.

The FBI and Chicago police raid that address and find bomb making materials and more FALN evidence with information from the captured terrorists. Agents raid addresses in Milwaukee, New York, and New Jersey. They take down more FALN safe houses. 6 years after the bombings began, a federal jury finds the captured FALN terrorists guilty of sedicious conspiracy, weapons violations, interstate transportation of stolen vehicles, and other charges. But notorious FALN suspected leader William Morales still remains a fugitive.

A group of us got together just before sentencing. One FALN member decides to cooperate in exchange for a reduced sentence.

He says the 11 terrorists were in Evston to rob an armored car to finance more bombings.

He also describes a meeting at a Milwaukee safe house. They had this meeting in which they plot this thing out. And the man leading the meeting, he's got his mask on, so you can't recognize him, but he's got no hands. So immediately, everybody knew it was William Morales.

Fanatical FALN leader William Morales's hands were maimed years earlier while making a bomb. Investigators press for more information, but the cooperating FALN member doesn't know how to find Morales. agents try a different approach and question their informant about how the FALN recruits members.

We have to know how they bring new people into the group. Once we know that, then we can go after them.

Strong activists who are ready to do Investigators learned that the FALN recruits from the ranks of Puerto Rican radicals.

Anyone who joins must drop all political activities in order to maintain a low profile. With that pattern in mind, FBI special agent Rick Hans searches through hundreds of files on Puerto Rican radicals. It's a longshot attempt to identify the remaining FALN terrorists. We looked for individuals that had stopped attending rallies and things like that that had made themselves quite well known prior to that time and we focused on them for surveillances. More than a year passes before the FBI finally finds one suspect who seems to lead a double life.

Very, very quickly, we realize this guy's clandestine. He's doing things that's not normal.

Agents track the suspect to an FALN safe house. Based on the suspect's behavior, the FBI gets a court order allowing listening devices and wire taps. In March 1983, two years after first gaining cooperation from the FALN informant, the FBI gets a break. Through a wire tap, they overhear a suspected FALN member on the phone asking a mysterious man in Mexico to come to Chicago. He refused to come up and said, basically, why don't you come visit me? Uh, I'm having plastic surgery done. Uh, I'm in need of uh good identification.

and I can't come into the country. Uh, I'll be too easily recognized. That sort of thing.

The mysterious man says to call the same number in a week. In a huge break, investigators identify the mystery voice as that of the FALN's fugitive leader.

By his voice, we were pretty sure that it was probably William Morales. It's the first time the FBI has heard Morales's voice since his bold escape from New York police custody four years earlier. The FBI traces terrorist leader William Morales's phone call to a cafe in Pueblo Mexico.

Trying to change my look. Back in Chicago, the FBI is stuck. Absolutely. They have no jurisdiction in Mexico. Agents plan to continue listening to their wiretap and arrest Morales when he makes his plan to come back to America. But since Morales may have had plastic surgery and significantly changed his appearance, agents asked Mexican Federalis to secretly photograph him. FBI special agent Rick Horn. The Federalis went down to that coffee shop and found Morales seated at a table there.

Morales had severely maimed his hands years earlier while making a bomb. He cannot protect himself or fire a gun. The FBI warns the Federalis he is probably accompanied by an armed bodyguard. FBI special agent Don Wolford.

We told him that these guy's got backup. You know, watch it. You just can't walk up with this guy and say you're in the car.

The Federalist don't see a bodyguard and decide to make the arrest themselves. NYPD detective Elmer Toro.

They were not supposed to take him down. were supposed to take photographs and they decide to make the arrest and uh Willie Morales, like a nice trained terrorist, he simply gave up and I provided the opportunity for his bodyguard to stepped out of the restaurant.

The bodyguard opens fire, shooting both Federalis, one of them critically. The other Federal returns fire, killing the bodyguard. He takes Morales into custody, but his arrest comes at a great price. The wounded Federalei dies on the way to the hospital. New York police detective Elmer Toro immediately flies down to Mexico to interview Morales and try to arrange his return.

Morales being in police custody and uh having killed a police officer, I'm sure was subject to some degree of torture by the F federalis down there.

Morales greets Detective Toro like a longlost friend. He was happy to see me. And he said to me, and I always remember this is Elmer. I want to go back with you.

Take me with you. Detective Toro says he'll draw up the papers. And Morales promises to sign.

You're on your way. Sign anything. Just take me with you. Okay. With you. Once Mexican police learn that Morales is going back to the US, they treat him better to avoid a possible scandal.

Okay. Back at his hotel, Detective Toro calls the FBI with the incredible news about Morales.

Getting anything done in Mexico is just like, forget it. But now he's talking about, I want to come back. And you know, we're all saying, thank you, Lord.

All right, let him come back. But it's not that simple. All of a sudden, I put the 6:00 news and there is the bastard denouncing us.

My client is being Morales appears on TV flanked by radical lawyers from Cuba, the US, and Mexico.

He now angrily condemns America. By this time, he's got a battery of attorneys from all over the place.

He had people from Cuba, the attorneys from Cuba, very powerful attorneys. And once he was protected by this attorneys, he didn't need Omer Toro anymore. He didn't want to come back anymore.

Detective Toro now realizes that Morales used him to gain better treatment in jail while waiting for his lawyers to arrive.

In the months to come, Cuba uses its influence and money to win the release of Morales. He's on the beach in Cuba in San Fuego's Cuba. I believe sooner or later, Fidel Castro's government is going to go and maybe we'll see Morales at that point.

With Morales in permanent exile and other key members in prison, the FALN's 8-year reign of terror comes to an end. The FBI and police, through dedicated investigative work and patient long-term surveillance, have defeated one of the most deadly domestic terror groups in US history. In the United States, violent extremists embark on a campaign of terror nearly two decades before the Oklahoma City bombing. bank robberies, bombings, escalating acts of destruction.

When their agenda turns to murder, FBI counterterrorism experts team up with state police to stop a group of violent radicals before they strike again.

In the 1970s, a string of bank robberies and bombings spread fear and destruction along the east coast. The FBI faced a new breed of criminal, the domestic terrorists. I'm Jim Calstrom, former head of the FBI's New York office. For nearly a decade, these self-proclaimed revolutionaries operate underground. Law enforcement vowed to unearth them once and for all.

Interstate 80 is an isolated stretch of highway in northern New Jersey. On December 21st, 1981, trooper Philip Lam Monaco of the New Jersey State Police makes a routine traffic stop.

Driver seems nervous. A Monica sees that he has a gun. Hands up on the steering wheel. Put your license up on the dash. Step out of the vehicle now. Keep your hands up. Back up against the car now. Stay there. Don't move. Just stay there. Got any more weapons on you? Keep stay there. Don't you move. Yeah, sir. Stay in the car. Stay in the car, sir. Stay in the car. Stay in the car, sir.

A passing motorist spots the empty police cruiser and stops. He checks to make sure everything is all right. In the snow, he sees the road trooper bleeding and motionless.

He uses the police radio to call for help. Can you hear me? State trooper barracks. Go ahead.

I'm here on I80. I'm in a patrol car. What's your name, sir? Troopers on duty at the Blairestown State Police Barracks are surprised to hear a civilian voice on their radio.

Troopers on the ground. He's motionless. Make a good shot. Not moving at all. Stay at the car, server. On the way.

All available troopers respond to the report of the shooting. We have an officer shot. Officer down.

Charles Co is a major with the New Jersey State Police. Virtually every road trooper that was on duty that day responded to the scene. We're all basically road troopers to start with. That's where we started from. We all knew the dangers involved. And of course, you never think it's going to happen to you. And you really don't think it's going to happen to someone like a Phil Monica. L Monaco is a legend in the department. Arriving at the scene, Lieutenant Richard Ryan can't believe he's been shot. Initial shots struck Phil in his chest area. He was wearing a bulletproof vest, but the impact of the shots kind of turned him a little and one of the shots went in under his armpit and went directly into his heart and basically killed him that one shot.

Investigators find Lmon Monaco's service revolver empty. All six rounds fired, indicating the trooper had gone down fighting.

Lieutenant John Mendres processes the crime scene, finding further evidence of the gun battle.

I obtained pieces of glass fragments, 12 9mm bullet casings at the scene. They were in a snowbank and in a general area.

From the size and number of bullet casings, Mendre believes the murder weapon is a 9 mm semi-automatic pistol. He searches for the gun, but it is nowhere to be found. EMTs transfer Philip Lam Monaco's body to the hospital as 250 police officers go after his killer. New Jersey and Pennsylvania state police stop and question motorists. One man remembers seeing two men as they left the scene.

They were driving a 1977 Chevy Nova with Connecticut license plates. Police set up checkpoints along the Delaware River. Officers search miles of highway and back roads looking for the killers. The response was overwhelming. People were coming out of the woodwork to help us and offer leads and try to help us find the car, find the people responsible for this.

Hours later, a narcotics detective and a state trooper find the Nova. The car has been abandoned on a rural road 3 miles from the crime scene.

Detectives find an empty holster. Troopers search the vehicle for clues. They find several bullet holes in the car's exterior.

It was a shot pattern into the hood of the car into the windshield and the right front passenger window was shot out, which indicates that he was shooting at the passenger. Investigators suspect it was likely the passenger of the car who murdered Phil Lam Monaco. The driver was in such a hurry to ditch the vehicle. He left behind a crucial piece of evidence. On the dashboard in plain sight was a Connecticut driver's license in the name of Barry Eastberry. For now, East's name and address are investigators only link to L Monaco's killer.

And I actually left that scene with another trooper and immediately drove to Connecticut to follow up that lead that night. And we proceeded to the address and it was in downtown New Haven, Connecticut.

The address on the Eastbury driver's license turns out to be a hotel rather than a residence. So, it was turning out to be a dead end lead.

We met with the FBI later in the morning, and they told us that they had been at that same hotel a few months earlier following the leadup on an individual by the name of Raymond Luke Lavasser.

Lavasser is one of the FBI's 10 most wanted fugitives. Agents believe he is the leader of a violent radical group called the Sam Melville Jonathan Jackson unit.

We got him on that. The FBI suspects the group of masterminding a series of bank robberies and bombings.

Now investigators wonder whether the group is also responsible for the murder of trooper Phil Lam Monaco.

I'd like to take those prints and see if we can match them up. Agents send Lavasser's file to the state lab in New Jersey to compare his fingerprints with those found in Lenova. involved in a lot of stuff.

Unfortunately, none of them matched, which we could not believe. Uh, it just didn't make any sense.

Ryan takes a closer look at Lavasser's wanted flyer. I reread the flyer and on the bottom of small print. Right at the last line, it said, "May be accompanied by Thomas William Manning."

FBI agents pull Manning's file. to be able to get money. The photo on his wanted poster is the man they know as Barry Eastbury.

Examiners match Manning's file fingerprints to those lifted from the Nova confirming that Barry Eastbury is an alias for Thomas Manning.

Okay. Well, the two are If Manning is involved in the murder of Philip Lam Monaco, investigators are up against a dangerous fugitive. According to FBI files, Manning met Levasser in prison where they both served time on drugs, weapons, and robbery charges.

He's been involved in several bank robberies. The two men formed a radical group called the Melville Jackson unit. According to special agent Leonard Cross,

they were well-versed in a lot of guerilla tactics. They studied guerilla manuals. They studied a lot of the radical left literature. um from the uh late60s, the mid60s and the early 70s,

the group began a reign of terror, claiming responsibility for seven bombings in Massachusetts and New York between 1976 and 1979, including the bombing of two courouses, the Middle Sex County Courthouse in Lowel Massachusetts and the Suffach County Courthouse in Boston, where 20 people were injured. According to their propaganda, the Mailville Jackson unit targets institutions and businesses to protest government and corporate policies they believe are unfair.

FBI special agent Ed Peterson is investigating the radical group. What's going on?

I think they viewed themselves as some champion of the downtrodden, the poor. Actually, they never did anything for the poor. And you know, all they were committed to were acts of violence.

Agents believe the group funds its violent political agenda with bank robberies, carefully planned operations that are executed with military precision.

It was obvious that these people were not your everyday criminals. They were an organized criminal group who were traveling the New England states and committing numerous crimes. Uh, the most serious obviously the murder of Trooper Lmon Monica.

On Christmas Eve 1981, 2,000 law enforcement officers from several states attend the funeral of Trooper Lam Monaco. The wave of support overwhelms his wife, Donna.

I was just amazed that all the way up, it was a good half mile from the church, cars had started to park to come to the funeral. Phil Lam Monaco was one of the most respected troopers in the state of New Jersey.

He was a great trooper. He really, really was. And I think one of the main things that made him a great trooper was he really, really loved and respected his job. He was one of the good ones.

He was the idol of a lot of young troopers. He had trained a lot of young troopers and and the tactics of stopping cars and looking for contraband vehicles on the highway. Superintendent Clinton Pagano makes Donna Lmonaco a solemn promise. The New Jersey State Police will do everything in their power to bring her husband's killers to justice.

I just could see in his eyes the sincerity and I just knew. I just knew he would make sure that from that point is where I grew confidence and knowing they're going to get caught. Whoever they are, they're going to be found and they're going to get caught because he promised me.

At a nearby municipal building, New Jersey and Pennsylvania State Police work closely with the FBI to find the men who murdered Trooper Lemon Monaco. The task force follows up on dozens of leads. Firearms investigators asked gun shop owners in the area if anyone has sold 9mm ammunition to a man named Barry Eastbury.

They got a hit in Straburg, Pennsylvania, which is right across the river from the shooting.

Three months earlier, a Barry Easterly, not East Bur, had purchased 9mm ammunition at a gun shop in Stradsburg. The name seems too close to be a coincidence. No, I'm sorry.

If these were the bullets used in the killing, the 3-month time span is an important clue.

Thank you. We felt that these people resided in this general area. They weren't just passing through. We were working very closely with the Pennsylvania State Police at that time. We notified them about this fine. Pennsylvania State Police.

Two days later, the Pennsylvania State Police receive an unusual phone call. They left their dog.

A local landlord calls with a complaint. The Pennsylvania State Police was notified by a fellow by the name of Charles Miller, who lived in Marshall's Creek, Pennsylvania, directly across the river in the greater Straburg area.

Miller owned several rental properties in the area. A dog has been abandoned inside one of his houses. He's not seen the tenants for nearly two weeks. According to Miller, the house was rented by a man named Barry Easterly. SWAT teams converged on the rented farmhouse.

Get out. Get out. Get out. They searched the house from room to room. Whoever lived there left in a hurry. The occupants of the house had abandoned clothing, personal photos, and even their dog. In one room, police find radical literature and a sketch featuring an AK-47 assault rifle.

We get the bombs going out here with that chest full of In the bedroom, they find the tools of domestic terrorists. the map again.

We found all types of paraphernalia, information on how to make bombs, bomb making material.

Police also find 9 mm bullets, the same caliber that killed trooper Phil Lam Monaco.

They believe the rented property is a safe house where Thomas Manning, his wife, and children lived at the time of the Le Monaco shooting. everything in this trunk. We've got materials.

Investigators find documents that offer fresh insight into the radical group's operations.

They apparently were planning to pull a bank robbery in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

We had those schematics. We also found a critique of the bank robbery where several policemen were killed a few years before that.

And all of these things they had to leave behind because they left in such haste. In another bedroom, Sergeant Tom Evans finds a small phone book.

We began to write down all the phone numbers were in that book. There were no names. There were nicknames. Um, and there was no area code.

Police also find a photograph of a man they can't identify. Do you know who that is? Who's this?

According to the landlord, the man in the picture lived in the Manning's guest room. The family referred to him as Uncle David. Investigators wonder if Uncle David was Manning's passenger the night of the shooting and whether he is responsible for the murder of trooper Philip Lam Monaco. The search for a cop killer evolves into a manhunt for a group of domestic terrorists. A raid on an abandoned Pennsylvania farmhouse yields two important clues, a mysterious photograph, and a book of telephone numbers. Dozens of phone numbers are listed.

Sergeant Evans of the New Jersey State Police notes that none of them have area codes.

Troopers said to me, "Those look like Boston phone exchanges." Next morning, we went to Boston. And we started to run down the phone numbers to see who we could come up with. There were at least 100 phone numbers in there. One of them had a little note on it said rent.

How you doing, sir? Telephone number belongs to a company in Boston that rents out apartments.

Investigators meet with the manager. Possibly one of your tenants. I showed him the picture. He said to me, Trooper, I'm sorry, but I hardly ever see these people. They just mail in their checks. It looks like another dead end.

The police give the phone book another look. Next to the rental company's phone number,

someone has written a figure. $275. So I said to the guy, "Do you have any apartment building or apartments that rent for $275?"

The manager tells them the company has only one apartment that rents for that amount.

It is currently vacant and being renovated. So, we rushed up there and stopped them from repainting the apartment.

Uh, Massachusetts State Police got their forensic people in there. The apartment has been thoroughly cleaned, but investigators find fingerprints in obscure places on a light bulb

and behind the toilet in the bathroom. The tenant left no forwarding address according to the building supervisor. So, at that point, the guy said to me, "Well, you ought to talk to his girlfriend."

At 2:00 in the morning, police interview the suspect's girlfriend. Is there any information or anybody that you know,

although she does not tell investigators who her boyfriend really is. She gives them the name of his stepfather.

Yeah. The next morning, Lieutenant Evans drives to the suburbs outside Boston to question the suspect's stepfather. I showed him the picture and he said, "What has Dicky done now?" And I said, "Dicky who?" And he said, "Dicky Williams, who called the command post, gave him Richard Charles Williams' name. They ran that name against the fingerprints that we had, and bingo, it was him." So, we had the uh second person identified.

Richard Williams was Thomas Manning's passenger the night Phil Lam Monaco was murdered.

The violent radical is now wanted as a cop killer. Investigators on the case face an extraordinary challenge. Finding a group of fugitives who are as elusive as they are dangerous. New England authorities and the FBI join ranks to track down Manning, Lavasser, and Williams.

Special Agent Ed Peterson is assigned to assist the New Jersey police in the manhunt. It was really important as far as the FBI and all of law enforcement to put them under a magnifying glass and to look at every possible contact, you know, to try to think like they would think, you know, to to try and get into that mindset and to understand, you know, what motivated them and where they would look to go.

The task force sifts through hundreds of hours of intelligence on the Melville Jackson unit. According to their files, the fugitives have a history of using different aliases to conceal their identities

and various mail drops to hide their locations. We knew that we had a tough job because they did not remain in one place. They didn't do the conventional things that fugitives generally do.

They went to such extremes to hide their identities. In 1981, a man walks into the town clerk's office in Brattleboro, Vermont with an unusual request. He needs a copy of a birth certificate for an infant who died in the early 1950s. The clerk becomes suspicious.

Can you excuse me for Brattleboroough is a small town and she knows the infant's family.

How you doing, sir? Do you have any ID on you? Is there a problem? No problem, sir. I just need to see your ID.

Get on the ground. Don't do it. Get out now. Get down. Get down. Get up. Get police later identify the man as Raymond Lasser after finding his fingerprints in an abandoned vehicle nearby. They suspect he was trying to establish a new identity by stealing the birth certificate of a dead infant.

Headed out in the parking lot. It's a white male. In January 1982, Thomas Manning joins Lavasser on the FBI's 10 most wanted list. Authorities turn up the heat on the fugitives. 4 months later, FBI agent John Marty responds to the scene of a bank robbery. Two mass gunmen had stolen $60,000 from a bank in Burlington, Vermont. According to Agent Marky, the precision of the operation points to the Melville Jackson unit. All three individuals that went into the bank went in right after an armored car delivery. One man stood in the lobby.

The other two vaulted the counter. One of them took the money from the telet draws. The other one took the money that had just been delivered.

Go get go. The money in the telet drawers was rigged with die packs. They look like a stack of money. When you take them out of a bank, there's electronic sensor that causes them to activate. And then within 7 seconds, they go off, letting off tear gas and a red dye, which dies the money. They threw about $20,000 out the window because it had die packs in it. It was apparent to me that we ought to consider Raymond Lavasser and Thomas Manning and maybe his associate Richard Williams as possible suspects in that bank robbery.

Two months later, three men rob a bank in Syracuse, New York, netting $195,000. The MMO is nearly identical to the Burlington robbery, but with one exception.

They only took the money that was delivered by the armed car. They did not take any of the money out of the teladraws. That way they eliminated the possible die packs. It was my opinion that we were dealing with the same people who robbed the South Burlington branch and you could account for the change of not taking money from the Teldraws because they would have discussed the die packs. In just two months, over $235,000 has been stolen from area banks.

Authorities are concerned that the Melville Jackson unit is amassing a war chest to finance a new wave of terror. With the threat of more bombings looming, investigators make a difficult decision.

They will try to find the terrorists by looking for their children. Pictures of the Manning and Levasser children are distributed to schools, sport clubs, and pediatricians in the area.

Can you take a look at this and we see if you recognize any of these children? That was very controversial. I mean, we had a lot of conversations as far as distributing the pictures of the children cuz the children were innocent in this. They just were living with the parents. They were 8 n 10 11 12 year old kids.

Pass them around. Investigators feel they have no choice. Okay. Somebody does. The group is deadly and lives are at stake.

You don't know any of the parents either, do you? Unfortunately, the gamble does not pay off.

Trump, the fugitives have hidden their children. Well, thank you. Thank you. To make matters worse, the gang launches a series of new attacks. On December 16th, police in White Plains, New York, receive a frantic call. An unidentified man has phoned in a bomb threat to a local newspaper.

According to the caller, the bomb has been planted in an office building. Fortunately, dozens of employees had evacuated before the building exploded. The blast destroyed nearly every window in the building. Inside, investigators find a communicate from a group calling themselves the United Freedom Front. The UF claims responsibility for the bombing. Agents on the case recognize the UF's distinctive assault rifle logo.

United Freedom. It is nearly identical to a sketch they found in Manning Safe House. and that's the real deal.

We actually compared those side by side and we decided that the logo looked enough in our opinion that it was them.

We thought that the United Freedom Front, who took credit for that bombing, was in fact the new name for the people involved in the Monarchy killing.

That's not all right. Over the next year, the UF claims responsibility for four more bombings. On December 14th, 1983, they call the press to issue a chilling statement. They intend to destroy the offices of a National Defense contractor in Queens, New York. Caller indicates that a statement from the group can be found in a Manhattan mailbox. The letter denounces US involvement in Central America, the Caribbean, and the Middle East. The bomb squad recovers two suitcase bombs before they can detonate.

Finding an intact bomb is an important break for special agent John Marky. The materials used in that bomb were very similar to materials used in the Sam Melville Jonathan Jackson unit bombings in the 70s. The elements of the bomb that was similar was the type of clock used that the crystal on top of the clock a hole was melted into the crystal and a brass screw was screwed in to the crystal. Special agent Leonard Cross is familiar with the design. He investigated the group's early bombings in the 1970s. In February 1984, Cross becomes the coordinator of the task force hunting the killers.

The investigation into the radical group is now in its eighth year. The terrorists have stayed a step ahead of authorities by repeatedly assuming new identities. Agent Cross and the FBI task force decide to take a new approach.

What we tried to do was plot where we knew they had lived. safe houses, where they had bombed, where they had committed bank robberies. So, we started putting this all up on a map.

Slowly but surely, pattern emerges. The group's activities are concentrated in a fourstate area that includes New York Massachusetts Vermont and Connecticut. FBI.

In the spring of 1984, the FBI launches Operation Western Sweep. A mission designed to close in on the dangerous fugitives.

In 1984, the FBI launches Operation Western Sweep, a mission to apprehend three key members of a violent radical group. Agents believe the group has orchestrated numerous acts of domestic terrorism.

The New Jersey State Police suspect one of the terrorists also murdered trooper Phil Lmanaco.

Sir, stand. Hundreds of investigators comb areas where the group is known to operate. If we had the bombing,

as agents uncover the group's safe houses, the FBI deploys SWAT teams to search them. It was frustrating because we couldn't apprehend them, but we felt as long as they kept committing crimes, they were still out there. They hadn't gone into total hiding, there was a better chance we could catch them.

Agent John Marky tries to predict when the terrorists will strike again. Based on the group's unique lifestyle, he develops an ingenious theory. There were a series of four bank robberies in 1982 and 1983 in upper state New York along Interstate 90 between Syracuse and Alb, New York. Marky divides the total amount of money stolen by the number of days between robberies. He calculates that the group is operating on a budget of about $737 per day. Based on that, you could predict when the next robbery would occur. I was predicting that the next robbery would be between June 1st and June 14th of 1984.

Marky's prediction is right on target. On June 9th, the gang hits a bank in Norfol Virginia.

The ammo is familiar. Three armed men enter the building. Two of them jump the counter. They subdue bank personnel at gunpoint.

Ignoring the cash in the drawers, they grab bags of money that have just been delivered by an armored car service. This is not a joke. I will steal.

They did not take any of the money out of the teladraws. That way they eliminated the possible die packs, bait money, and sounding the alarm. The gang seems to be getting smarter with each new robbery. Investigators need a lead, however small, to break the case wide open. Special Agent Ed Peterson.

We knew no matter how good any fugitive thinks he or she is, no matter how good they think they are, some point at some time, they're going to make a careless mistake.

In the summer of 1984, the fugitives make that crucial mistake. On August 4th, the owner of a storage facility in Bingington, New York, contacts the FBI. One of his customers hasn't paid his bill in 2 years. The manager opened the storage unit so he could auction off the contents. What he found inside terrified him. The contents in there included materials on how to make bombs, how to handle firearms training, research on various corporations, uh, and a lot of radical material uh, and a lot of Marxist type literature.

Agents find bomb making diagrams in the storage unit. They show a timer assembled with brass screws. Earlier in the investigation, agents found an unexloded bomb with similar brass screws at one of the group's targets.

The bomb is designed to detonate a massive bundle of dynamite with a single electric charge. The distinctive design links Levasser and his gang to bombings all over the northeast. There are hundreds of pieces of evidence in the storage unit. Investigators follow up on every clue, no matter how obscure.

The magazines taken out of the storage bin at Bingington, New York. At first, nobody thought they would be of any value.

But an address label on an old seed catalog reveals a new name in the investigation, Jack Horning.

Investigators trace the address to Ansonia Connecticut. According to neighbors, the Horning family moved away years earlier.

The trooper that was assigned to this lead felt again, we have another dead-end lead. However, he continued to interview people in the neighborhood, and he developed a babysitter who had lived a few houses down, and she babysat for the Horning children.

The teenager remembers the Hornings well. She tells the trooper that Mrs. Horning was a normal mom. The kids were well behaved. The entire time she worked for the Hornings, nothing out of the ordinary happened.

But then she remembers one small incident. One day she was out with Mrs. Horning when they had a motor vehicle accident.

On a hunch, the trooper follows up with the Connecticut Department of Motor Vehicles.

He is unable to find an accident report involving a Mrs. Horning. But one report does match the time and location of the incident.

The key was that the babysitter was listed on the accident report as a passenger in that vehicle.

The name the driver gave police at the time was not Horning, but he This is interesting.

Judy Heim's Connecticut license has since expired. It was traded for a New York license in 1980.

From Connecticut to later, the New York license was turned in for an Ohio license. an address.

According to DMV records, the Ohio license is still current. Judy Heim's name along with her address in Columbus is forwarded to Sergeant Tom Evans. I called the Columbus Police Department.

Yeah. I said, "What is at that address?" And the guy said to me, "It's a mail drop." And a mail drop meant that's them. That that's their MO. That's what they use. They didn't have mail sent to their home. to give me.

Okay, great. Let's go. In Columbus, the FBI rents a vacant house across the street from the mail drop.

There, agents can monitor the facility with video cameras. The mail drop is a 247 operation, so this was going to be difficult to surveil. On November 3rd, 3 and 1/2 weeks into the stakeout, a woman arrives at the mail drop.

Investigators visually identify her as the wife of Raymond Lavasser. It's the first time now in probably over 10 to 12 years that any law enforcement agency had any of these people actually in sight under surveillance. So, you can imagine how the adrenaline was pumping. The fugitive's wife is law enforcement's only link to the terrorists. Rather than making an arrest, agents follow her, hoping she will lead them to her husband. In 1984, the FBI and a multi-state task force trail a group of domestic terrorists. The violent radicals are suspected of a series of bank robberies and bombings and the murder of a New Jersey state police trooper.

Investigators tracked the group from a safe house in Connecticut to a mail drop in Columbus, Ohio. After nearly a decade, their only lead to the terrorists location is the wife of gang leader Ray Levasser. Agents follow her as she leaves the mailrop. They know that like the rest of the group, Lavasser's wife is skilled at covering her tracks and spotting a tail. They're careful to keep their distance, using aerial surveillance as a backup in case she slips away. Detective Richard Ryan.

She was on and off the highway numerous times stopping starting looking around, taking local roads back onto the interstate, back off. So, it was a difficult surveillance.

2 and 1/2 hours later, the target stops at a house in Deerfield, Ohio. Once she arrived the house, a surveillance was set up in the area from different locations as best as they could, and it was a very rural area. There were farmers fields, corn fields, things of that nature.

New Jersey State Trooper Richard Tao watches the house from a distance. Approximately 20 minutes later, a male subject left the house and got in his car and left the area. The male subject is Richard Williams, a man wanted for the murder of New Jersey State Trooper Philip Lam Monaco. FBI agents follow Williams to a safe house in Cleveland. They now have two houses under surveillance 60 mi apart.

In one location, we had the suspected murderer of Trooper Philip Lammon Monica. And the second location we had top 10 FBI fugitive Ray Lavaser. Surveillancees continued through the night and into the morning.

Around 9:40 a.m. the Lassers leave their house. All right, fellas. Let me know when you're in position so we can go.

Go, go, go, go, go. SWAT team moves in. They arrest Ray Lavasser along with his wife.

The call then immediately went out to Ohio up to Cleveland. That Lasser was in custody. So now a decision was made to raid the Cleveland, Ohio house.

In Cleveland, agents and police surround the home of Richard Williams. Williams, a suspected murderer and terrorist, gives up without a fight. Don't

move. Nothing wrong. Come on now. Come on. After years of work, the task force has captured two of the group's three key men in less than an hour.

We had Ray Levaser and his wife. We had Vicky Williams. The only remaining fugitives that we had was Tom Manning and his wife. Agents question Richard Williams about Thomas Manning's location.

Williams stalls for hours. Thomas Manning. With every passing moment, the fugitives have more time to escape.

Where is he? Finally, Williams breaks down and reveals the addresses of three safe houses located in Jefferson, Ohio.

One of them belongs to Thomas Manning. He's gone. We proceeded to that location and conducted a very extensive search.

William stall tactics have given the Mannings enough time to flee, but not enough time to cover their tracks. Inside their safe house, investigators find handguns, fake IDs, and $32,000 in cash.

They also find a thousandpage record of the group's activities. In one room, agents find a police scanner tuned to a frequency used by the FBI. In another room, they find explosives and bomb making supplies. They also find a bomb kit that contains distinctive brass screws that match unexloded bombs recovered in 1976 and 1983. They recover a 9mm semi-automatic pistol. Smith Wesson. At the FBI forensics lab, technicians analyze the gun. They compare the bullet that killed trooper Philip Lam Monaco to bullets fired from the 9mm handgun.

We were able to determine that that was the weapon that was used to kill Phil Lam Monaco.

Although they have finally found the murder weapon, tracing the owner of the gun will be difficult. The serial number has been filed off. Technicians use a chemical solution to raise the number. It is barely legible beneath the surface of the metal. Agents traced the 9mm to a gun shop in Norfol Virginia. There it was purchased by a woman named Deborah Anne Fury. Fury had listed an address in Virginia Beach. Investigators check out the location. It turns out to be another mail drop.

The surveillance team waits to see who will collect the mail. When a woman arrives and opens the box, agents identify her. Deborah Anne Fury is in reality Thomas Manning's wife. The FBI has finally found a link to the last member of the radical terrorist group. In Ohio, the FBI and police have arrested key members of a violent radical group charged with robbery and domestic terrorism. One of them, Richard Williams, is suspected of killing a police officer. Two of the group's members, Thomas Manning and his wife, are still at large.

It has been 5 months since Manning and his family fled their safe house in the rural town of Deerfield. Right up here, the FBI traces a gun found in the safe house to an address in Virginia Beach, Virginia. As it turns out, the address is another mail drop. After weeks of surveillance, agents spot the fugitive's wife picking up the mail.

Special Agent Leonard Cross. We knew she had a scanner and she'd be scanning for police radio frequencies as well as FBI frequencies. We had special radios that were all encrypted that could not be picked up.

The surveillance at this point took us north. Manning's wife leads investigators to a safe house in Norfolk about 20 miles away. They do not want to arrest her until they can be sure her husband is at home. An hour later, investigators follow her to a nearby shopping center.

Get out. Get out. Get out. Get out. As an arrest team takes her into custody. A second team moves in on the safe house.

Manning is now outside, unaware he's being watched. Had no weapons. The decision was made so no one would get hurt. This would be the time to make the arrest.

Get out. Get out. GET OUT. GET OUT. GET OUT. GET OUT. GET OUT. GET OUT. DON'T RESIST. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.

Thomas Manning, the last of the terrorists, is arrested in his own backyard. In 1987, Thomas Manning and Richard Williams stand trial in Somerville, New Jersey. Donna Lam Monaco, the widow of Trooper Phil Lmanaco, attends the trial. It

was very important for me to be a part of the trial. I needed to be there. I needed to know exactly what went on. Uh, I wanted to make sure they were the two that killed Phil.

The two self-proclaimed revolutionaries are sentenced to life in prison for the murder of trooper Philip Lam Monaco. They receive additional sentences for their roles in a series of bank robberies and bombings starting in 1975. In separate trials, the wife of Thomas Manning is found guilty of conspiracy and sentenced to 15 years. Raymond Lavasser receives 45 years in prison for his role in the group's terrorist activities. His wife is released after spending several months in custody.

I think it's really important to set the record straight that these individuals Lea Manning Williams. They were nothing but criminals. These guys want to call themselves as freedom fighters or revolutionaries. At the end of the day, they were criminals. And that's the bottom line. I mean, when you commit bank robberies, when you set off bombs, when you kill a police officer who's only out there doing his job, the they were nothing more than criminals. After the trials, members of the New Jersey State Police visit Phil Le Monaco's grave for the very first time.

We went as a group to his grave site. We felt that uh we had the respect of Phil. He would know that we had done our best. Two decades after Philip Lam Monaco's death, people still leave flowers and flags on the side of the New Jersey highway he protected.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Operation Golden Rod: The FBI’s Secret High-Seas Arrest | The FBI Files"?

Jim Calstrom (Host), Tom Hansen (Guest), Oliver Buck Rall (Guest), Dwey Clarage (Guest), David Woody Johnson (Guest).

What is "Operation Golden Rod: The FBI’s Secret High-Seas Arrest | The FBI Files" about?

In June 1985, armed extremists hijack Royal Jordanian Air Flight 402 en route from Beirut to Amman, targeting American interests amidst rising global terrorism. The FBI and CIA coordinate a risky operation to apprehend the hijackers, showcasing their expanded authority in the fight against international terrorism and sending a strong message to radical groups.

What is mentioned in this The FBI Files episode?

14 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including FBI, Tom Hansen, FALN, Lebanon, Hezbollah, Royal Jordanian Air Flight 402. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Operation Golden Rod: The FBI’s Secret High-Seas Arrest | The FBI Files"?

The episode runs 2 h 28 min; the transcript is about 19,943 words in 442 timestamped sections.

More from The FBI Files

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated January 25, 2026.