Listen Now—Agent of Betrayal: The Double Life of Robert Hanssen

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Hey there, it's Erica to Day. I've got something special for you.

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It's a preview of a new CBS
News podcast I'm loving and truly fascinated by.

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It's called Agent of Betrayal, The
Double Life of Robert Hanson, and

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I think you're going to really enjoy
it. Robert Hanson was a man of

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incredible contradictions, a family man who
sexually betrayed his wife, a man of

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God and a sinner, a self
proclaimed patriot, and a traitor. AGENTA

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Betrayal tells the story of how Emma
the nuclear threat of the Cold War,

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Hanson, an FBI agent, leaked
America's most precious secrets to the country's sworn

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enemy, the Kremlin, in exchange
for cash and precious gems. Host and

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CBS News correspondent Major Garrett spent two
years researching Hanson and talking to over forty

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of his family, friends and colleagues, including the guy who caught him.

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Here's the first episode. If you
like what you hear, you can find

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new episodes of Agent of Betrayal,
The Double Life of Robert Hanson from CBS

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News on Thursdays, available wherever you
get your podcasts. The phone rang early

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Sunday morning. It was Eric O'Neil's
supervisor at the FBI. He says,

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I need to meet with you.
I said, okay, I'll come downtown.

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I'll come to the office and you
can tell me what's up. He

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said, no, you don't need
to I'm parked right outside. This was

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December two thousand that O'Neil was still
relatively new to the FBI. Now he

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was used to weekend calls from work, but never had a boss come to

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his apartment in Washington. Now.
I was scared because this doesn't happen.

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I don't think anyone's ever showed up
at someone's house on a Sunday unless they

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were arresting them. You were probably
walking out of your door in a cold

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sweat, right, Oh, yes, absolutely. I mean I'm tracking every

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target, looking at top of buildings, thinking, you know, like where

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where are they? But it was
just Eric's boss in his car. He

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looks at me and he says,
have you ever heard of a guy named

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Hanson? And I said no,
And he said good, because we want

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you to work undercover and help us
catch the Robert Hanson wasn't your typical suspect.

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He was a self proclaimed patriot,
a married father of six and a

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devout Catholic who was fervently anti communist, and yet he spent decades selling American

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secrets to our arch rival, the
Soviet Union and later Russia. He was

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a spy, and he was working
inside the FBI as a special agent when

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the FBI discovered it had a mole
in its midst The bureau needed a way

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to trap Hansen and, if possible, catch him in the act, so

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Eric O'Neil was assigned to work alongside
him at FBI headquarters. Hansen had stolen

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secrets from the FBI, now the
FBI wanted to steal secrets from him.

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Hanson loved his pomp pilot, talked
about his palm pilot more than his wife.

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The FBI suspected Hanson's most valuable secrets
lived inside his precious palm pilot.

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He certainly wanted to protect this device, so we had to get away from

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him much harder than it sounds,
because Hanson kept the palm pilot with him

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at all times in his left back
pocket. Of course, he couldn't sit

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on it, so when he sat
down, he pulled it out and he

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put it in his bag. Next
to him. That way, he would

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keep right next to his desk,
and we had to get him away from

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his bag with sufficient time to get
it out, copy the whole thing,

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and get it back before he knew
it was gone. So they hatched a

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plan. The ruse was pretty simple. Hanson's bosses would challenge him to a

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shooting contest at the FBI gun range
in the basement of headquarters, ten floors

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down from their office. In this
most petulant way, he grumbles to his

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feet, and he opens his desk, and he grabs his firearm and he

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holsters it, and for the first
time he's forgotten to reach down to that

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bag. Hanson had left the palm
pilot behind. An FBI colleague in the

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basement paged O'Neil. When Hanson arrived, that was his signal to move and

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went to his bag. Neil down, opened all the pockets, rifled through

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the back, found the palm pilot. You know, hands are shaking.

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This finally worked. We finally got
it. I found a floppy disk and

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a data cart, grabbed all three
things and ran down three flights of steps

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to the sixth floor, where we
had a tech team that had just been

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waiting. I handed over the devices
and go and they started copying them.

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His pager went off again. Hanson
was now on his way back upstairs.

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O'Neil had planned for this. He
traced the journey from the shooting range to

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the ninth floor, and when he
did it at a dead run, it

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took nine minutes. The tech guys
that are like, yeah, we're almost

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done, don't worry, and I
said, you don't understand. He's armed

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and I'm not. And if I
don't get up there before him, it's

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game over. He waited nervously.
Finally the door opened, O'Neil grabbed the

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goods and ran. I go back
up three flights of steps, got into

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my office, got to his desk, kneeled down in front of his bag,

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and my heart just fell because I
looked at his bag and realized I'm

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holding a Pom pilot, a sand
dis data card, and a floppy disk

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and there are four pockets that are
open, and I have no idea which

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pocket these things were in. And
I'm sitting there in front of his bag

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knowing I'm dead. There's no way
I'm getting this right. I hear him

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coming through that main door, so
I just dropped all the device's best guests,

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zipped everything back up, ran to
my desk, sat there, started

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to pretend I was typing something and
put like the best poker face I've ever

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had right on my face. Hanson
walked through the office's secure door. He

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comes through the main area, glares
at me, goes into his office and

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slams his door. The whole wall
shakes, and I'm right next to that

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wall, right where my desk is, and just a few feet away through

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a wall as his desk, and
I can hear the zip, and I'm

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thinking to myself, I'm dead.
I've blown this case. I ruined everything.

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I'm a stupid rookie. It's my
fault, and even if I survive,

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I'm never living this down. Robert
Hanson wasn't just any trader. He

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was the most damaging spy in FBI
history. I'm Major Garrett Chief, Washington

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correspondent for CBS News. I've been
reporting on the inner workings of this town

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for more than three decades. I've
covered lying politicians, scandals, and a

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fair amount of history. But I
have never ever come across anyone like Robert

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Philip Hanson. You may have heard
something about Hanson. Recently, in June,

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as we were working on this project, my CBS News team and I

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learned that Hanson had died in prison. An autopsy revealed the cause was colon

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cancer. Twenty three hours a day
in solitary confinement for two decades is brutal

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on the body and mind. There
was nothing suspicious about Hanson's death, he

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was seventy nine and in decline for
some time. But his life that is

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worthy of an autopsy too. My
team and I spent two years speaking with

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more than fifty of Hanson's friends,
family members, and former colleagues to try

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to understand why, why this self
avowed patriot would betray his country, his

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faith, and his family. Just
who was Hanson? From CBS News This

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is Agent of Betrayal. The Double
Life of Robert Hanson, Episode one,

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The Spy next Door. Robert Hanson
seemed like a regular dad. He had

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regular hours. I know that he
helped the kids with homework, went to

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their games, took them all to
church on Sunday. So it seemed like

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a very ordinary, nice family.
That's Nancy Cullen. She and her husband

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raised their two kids down the block
from the Hanson family. In the eighties

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and nineties. Bob Hanson, his
wife, Bonnie, and their children lived

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in Vienna, Virginia for most of
Bob's FBI career. Their bricks, split

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levels sat on a wide street amid
homes with large green lawns and proper sidewalks.

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There's a park and jogging paths a
short walk away. It's a Quintus,

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DC suburb, popular with federal employees
and their families. Nice, but

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not ostentatious. It was a close
neighborhood, a close street, and our

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kids all played out and called a
sack together, and we ran into each

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other and chatted a lot. Nancy
and Bonnie Hanson were part of a women's

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group that meant for lunch once a
month. How would you describe the Hansons

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as a family in the neighborhood.
Well, it was kind of like Donna

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Reid Nancy's referring to The Donna Reed
Show, a classic fifty sitcom best known

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today for its depiction of an all
American family. May I have your name,

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little lady, Donna Stone. I'm
married and have two children and your

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housewife. Well, now, don't
tell me you're a spy for the FBI.

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Nancy remembers Bonnie's shoulder length auburn hair
and that she was always well put

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together. Some even compared her to
Hollywood actress Natalie Wood. She was always

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baking, she would come to the
door in an apron I mean she was

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just a lovely mom. I mean
she was a mom, mom, mom,

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and with six kids, you know, it was hard to keep them

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all under control and handle all of
that. Bob Hanson, on the other

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hand, was a big guy six
foot three or four, grayish brown hair,

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rounded shoulders, and sort of a
lurching walk. Well, I think

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he was decent looking for a guy. He had a kind of a weird

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smile, kind of maybe that crookedish
smile that maybe screwed up his looks sometimes

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outwardly, nothing that would suggest what
was to be revealed, nothing at all.

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No, I mean, Robert Hanson
was a little bit reticent when we'd

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have our annual Labor Day block party, for example. He was a hangbacker.

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He wasn't someone that engaged or smiled
a whole lot. How did he

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dress? He always seemed pretty buttoned
up, buttoned down? Is that how

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you say? I think that he
wore a blazer to the block party one

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time, and the only reason I
remember that is my husband said, what's

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the matter with that guy? Nancy's
biggest beef with Bob Hanson. He sometimes

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parked as grayce Adan on the street
instead of the driveway. It just used

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to rankle me. Damn cars parked
on the street again, So he was

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as regular as pie. One key
to understanding Robert Hanson is that he lived

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in compartments, a different person to
different people. Now, we all do

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that to a certain degree. What
you reveal about yourself at work might be

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slightly different than how you act at
home or what you share with friends.

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The you remains consistent, your behavior
might very slightly depending on the setting.

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But Hansen was unusual. His compartments
were not only air tight, they were

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diametrically opposed to one another. It's
like there were many Robert Hansen's, each

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with his own moral compass. To
navigate Hanson's many dimensions, we need to

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go back to a neighborhood that could
have been the inspiration for the Donna Reshow.

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There's some old timey touches in this
neighborhood. Robert Hanson was born April

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eighteenth, nineteen forty four. In
Chicago and grew up on North Neva Avenue,

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a working class neighborhood near O'Hare Airport
place I visited recently. Lots of

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beautiful, single family homes, modest
to be sure, lawns finely trimmed.

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There are big oak trees and a
dairy queen nearby, almost to a house

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on Niva Avenue. Here are small
American flags in the lawns or American flags

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hung by the front door. The
year Hanson was born nineteen forty four,

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America was still at war, but
he grew up in postwar middle class prosperity

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in a predominantly white community. His
neighborhood was, like so many in America,

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affordable, redlined to keep African Americans
out, dads who worked, moms

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who stayed home. Hi, my
name's Jack Hoshower. I am Robert Hanson's

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best friend. Or what was that
like? When you're best friends with somebody

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from the time you were in high
school, to share all kinds of experiences

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together. When Jack says he shared
all kinds of experiences with his best friend,

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he means it. Jack is a
man of his era, the kind

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who calls women girls no matter their
age. He is one of the few

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who knew many compartments of Robert Hanson, but not quite all of them.

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Bob's mother, Vivian, was a
housewife and deferential, as the Times dictated.

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His father, Howard, served in
the Navy during World War Two,

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then worked as a Chicago cop for
nearly thirty years. He was assigned to

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a squad that targeted Communist sympathizers.
One time, as teenagers, Bob and

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best friend Jack were cruising the neighborhood
when a police car pulled them over.

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Bob got out to talk to one
of the officers, and guy Holler said,

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let him go. Voice his father's
Lieutenant Hanson. He's a good guy.

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Like so many fathers of that generation, Howard Hansen was stern law and

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order on the job, law and
order at home. He spoke little and

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wrote his son hard. For instance, when Bob was a kid, his

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father, over some transgression, rolled
him up in a floor rug, trapping

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him inside, and left him there. Howard seemed to delight in his son's

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failures, so much so he bribed
Bob's driving instructors to fail him on his

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first driving test. Bob did not
talk much about his strained relationship with his

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father, but the message from dad
to son was clear, He'll never be

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as good as me. My mom
would occasionally run into Bob's dad in the

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store shopping, and he would say
things about Bob that my mother had a

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hard time taking seriously because they were
so negative. She thought he was making

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some kind of a joke. Hanson, an only child, went to public

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schools Norwood Park Grammar School and William
Howard Taft High School. There, Bob

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found refuge in his friendship with Jack. They met in mister Pupo's freshman biology

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class. So we were the uncool
kids. We were the outside nerds.

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Bob loved to drive around with Jack. They would race their parents' cars,

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a cherry red corvet for Jack and
a fifty six or fifty seven Dodge with

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rounded fins for Bob. At one
point he dreamed of being a Formula one

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driver. We'd cruise around the car
and look at the pretty girls, and

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as we got older, our interests
changed, but also still like to look

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at pretty girls. Bob graduated high
school in nineteen sixty two, and that

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September moved into a second floor dorm
at Knox College near Peoria. Illinois.

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There he played intramurro basketball, majored
in chemistry, and perhaps most significant,

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took Russian language classes. But Howard
pushed his son, said he wanted Bob

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to become a doctor. To that
end, or perhaps to offset tuition costs,

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Bob spent college summers working at the
State Psychiatric Hospital in Chicago, where

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best friend Jack joined him. Bob
said, Hey, I'm working at the

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State Medal Hospital and there's student nurses
there. And I said, oh,

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I think I'll work in the metal
hospital. Okay, so maybe it was

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less about tuition or preparing for med
school. At the hospital, Jack and

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Bob were hired as recreational therapists,
basically camp counselors. It was their job

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to do activities with the patients.
They played Jim Rummy. They took patients

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on picnics and field trips to Wrigley
Field to see a ballgame. The nurses

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came too. As far as getting
dates went well, The numbers were in

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Jack and Bob's favor. There were
thirteen student nurses. And I thought I

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died in gone to heaven, right, So when did you meet Bonnie?

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Bonnie was working at the Medal hospital. Bonnie walk was way out of Bob's

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league, Doe wide, smart,
vivacious. She worked in the same ward

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as Bob and carpooled with Bob and
Jack and Bob and I had ride with

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her, Bob in the front seat, me in the back seat, and

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we were unmerciful in our teasing of
her as a female driver. How did

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she take it? I think she
took it all right in stride. But

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even so, Bob was smitten with
her, Not initially, I don't think.

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Yeah, he was dating a couple
of other girls, nurses and other

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people from the hospital, And now
I would say I misjudge Bonnie. At

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first. I misjudged her terribly.
I thought she was just a pretty bit

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of fluff. And I've never been
more wrong about a person in my life.

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After graduating from college, Bob followed
his dad's wishes to pursue a career

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in medicine and enrolled in Northwestern University's
dental school. It was nineteen sixty six.

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According to Jerry Takasono, his dental
school roommate, Bob was courteous,

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a good student, and a caring
person. He had an idetic memory,

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you know, there was another word
for it. Is like he had a

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photographic memory. He just knew a
lot of stuff and had a lot of

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stuff, you know, in his
brain. Bob said that it was a

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double edged sword because he never forgot
anything good and bad. Jerry says,

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Bob rarely ate in the school cafeteria
and went out to dinner with different women

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every night. My impression was it
was companionship. He didn't want to eat

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alone, which I can understand.
I found it interesting that it was always

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somebody else. There wasn't anybody that
he had a lasting relationship with. There

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was one other thing that stuck out
to Jerry. Most students went to lab

233
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dressed casually. Not Bob. Bob
wore a suit every day. And my

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advice to him after the two quarters
of human anatomy, which is probably like

235
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six months of dissecting a cadaver,
you know, I told him to burn

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00:20:18.880 --> 00:20:23.480
that suit. But Bob wore a
suit every day, even in dissection,

237
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so it smelt Bob bailed on dental
school after two years, but his same

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suit everyday habit followed him from the
cadaver lab at Northwestern to the halls of

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00:20:36.000 --> 00:20:40.759
the FBI. By the way,
the dark suits and matching demeanor later earned

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00:20:40.799 --> 00:20:47.039
him a nickname the Mortician. Bob
and Bonnie dated intermittently while he was in

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dental school, and she told me
that the letters he wrote to her are

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what made her fall in love with
him. I can only speculate what he

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00:20:59.359 --> 00:21:06.079
wrote. Apparently she was extremely impressed. In nineteen sixty eight, they decided

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00:21:06.119 --> 00:21:08.799
to tie the knot. People have
told us two things about the wedding.

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The first Bob's father, Howard,
seemingly always eager to torpedo. Bob asked

246
00:21:15.519 --> 00:21:21.440
Bonnie what she saw in his quote
loser son. Bonnie defended Bob. The

247
00:21:21.519 --> 00:21:26.839
second thing, Bob had an affair
with another woman not long before the wedding.

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She called Bonnie to tell her,
screaming at her over the phone,

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But Bob downplayed the tryst and promised
Bonnie that he would be faithful from then

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00:21:36.319 --> 00:21:41.279
on. Bonnie took him at his
word and they went ahead. Best friend

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00:21:41.400 --> 00:21:47.680
Jack was best man, Jack nice
Catholic wedding. I totally blew my best

252
00:21:47.720 --> 00:21:53.200
man speech at the reception, and
we ate and danced and that was about

253
00:21:53.240 --> 00:21:57.960
it. Married and still living in
Chicago, Hanson decided to pursue an MBA

254
00:21:59.000 --> 00:22:03.200
in accounting like his father before him, became a Chicago cop. It was

255
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then Jack witnessed a transformation in his
friend. Not long after the wedding,

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Bob converted to Catholicism, and he
was all in. Bob was raised a

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Lutheran, but it doesn't seem like
he was particularly devout as a child.

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Bonnie's family, on the other hand, was dogmatically Catholic. Bonnie brought Bob

259
00:22:25.720 --> 00:22:32.279
into Opus Day, a strict ultra
conservative Catholic movement. I went occasionally to

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a couple of his Opus Day evening
things when I was visiting. Best friend.

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00:22:38.880 --> 00:22:44.319
Jack recalls how unbending Hanson became.
And there's a time when they meet

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00:22:44.400 --> 00:22:48.759
Neil right and I knelt, But
I only knelt on one knee. That's

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00:22:48.799 --> 00:22:56.720
not right. It kneeled both knees. He was very, very Orthodox in

264
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a ritualistic way, encourages its members
to integrate Christian ideals into every facet of

265
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life. In fact, Opus Day
literally means work of God. The group

266
00:23:10.079 --> 00:23:14.839
is known for its secrecy. You
might know the fictionalized version from Dan Brown's

267
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The Da Vinci Code. Many call
Opus Day brainwashing cult. Now there's an

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ultraconservative Christian secret society Obviously, some
people fear what they don't understand. And

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00:23:23.920 --> 00:23:29.000
although that version of Opus Day was, you know, fictional, one thing

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is true. Opus Day, though
small, wields a lot of power.

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Bob's affiliation with Opus Da would eventually
bring him into contact with influential people throughout

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00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:44.880
Washington. At this point in the
early seventies, Bob was a Chicago cop,

273
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but he had his eyes set on
something much bigger, the FBI.

274
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Robert Hansen joined the FBI as a
special agent on January twelfth, nineteen seventy

275
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six. His demeanor there yet another
compartment of his personality. He was a

276
00:24:10.160 --> 00:24:15.880
very difficult boss and a difficult manager, very arrogant, contescending. He had

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a serious complex about his shortcomings and
how the FBI had treated him. His

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00:24:26.519 --> 00:24:30.599
FBI career began at a satellite office
in Gary, Indiana, where he worked

279
00:24:30.599 --> 00:24:36.559
white collar crime, which made sense
with his background and accounting. Two years

280
00:24:36.640 --> 00:24:41.640
later, the FBI moved Hanson to
New York. Neil Gallagher overlapped with him

281
00:24:41.640 --> 00:24:49.960
there. He was extremely reserved,
always wore a dark suit and white shirt.

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You know, some may say a
typical FBI agent, but you couldn't

283
00:24:56.960 --> 00:25:00.599
carry a conversation with him. If
a bunch of agents decided go out to

284
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celebrate and have a beer after work, it's probably the last guyte because he

285
00:25:04.880 --> 00:25:10.279
just has no personality. We all
know someone like this. They show up,

286
00:25:10.319 --> 00:25:15.240
but they're hardly noticed. In New
York, Hanson continued working financial crimes,

287
00:25:15.640 --> 00:25:18.000
then sought a post where he could
burrow into the world of spies.

288
00:25:18.839 --> 00:25:23.480
He was soon assigned to work on
a database that track foreign officials and intelligence

289
00:25:23.519 --> 00:25:30.480
officers posted in the US. The
position also gave him unrestricted access to the

290
00:25:30.519 --> 00:25:37.160
file room, where he spent hours
reviewing Soviet espionage cases. Now, this

291
00:25:37.319 --> 00:25:40.960
was in the midst of the Cold
War, the US and Soviets, each

292
00:25:41.119 --> 00:25:47.039
jocking for any advantage in pursuit of
global supremacy. Every scrap of intelligence could

293
00:25:47.079 --> 00:25:52.759
drive the countries toward war or bring
them closer to peace. I remember it

294
00:25:52.880 --> 00:25:57.079
very clearly, and it was a
very complicated time in America that in certain

295
00:25:57.119 --> 00:26:02.559
ways was reduced to a very simple
time. Joe Weisberg worked for the CIA

296
00:26:02.680 --> 00:26:07.039
in the nineteen nineties, but he's
best known for writing a hit television drama

297
00:26:07.079 --> 00:26:12.240
The Americans, about fictional undercover Soviet
spies living as Americans in the DC suburbs

298
00:26:12.240 --> 00:26:17.519
in the nineteen eighties. The show
takes place during the same Cold War era

299
00:26:17.599 --> 00:26:21.400
in which Hansen operated Why dare't we
do lose together? Because I am a

300
00:26:21.440 --> 00:26:26.279
KGB officer. Don't you understand that
after all these years, I would go

301
00:26:26.319 --> 00:26:29.920
to jail, I would die,
I would lose everything before I would betray

302
00:26:29.960 --> 00:26:34.799
my country. And the simple idea
was the Soviet Union was bad and we

303
00:26:34.799 --> 00:26:38.960
were good. And this was best
expressed by Ronald Reagan. I believe that

304
00:26:40.039 --> 00:26:42.960
many of the things they have done
are evil in any concept of morality that

305
00:26:42.960 --> 00:26:48.119
we have. When he started saying
over and over again that they were an

306
00:26:48.160 --> 00:26:52.440
evil empire, and that really appealed
to me because I had a sort of

307
00:26:52.680 --> 00:26:57.440
simplistic worldview, so I could hop
on board of his simplistic worldview, and

308
00:26:57.799 --> 00:27:02.880
I took it so serious that I
wanted to go fight against the evil empire.

309
00:27:03.799 --> 00:27:08.119
The Cold War brought daily bouts of
anxiety and paranoia for citizens and governments

310
00:27:08.160 --> 00:27:12.720
alike. For a lot of people
of my generation, this was a kind

311
00:27:12.759 --> 00:27:18.160
of daily fear. A significant number
of people having gone through the drills we

312
00:27:18.200 --> 00:27:22.160
went through where you would go sit, you know, kneel under your desk

313
00:27:22.240 --> 00:27:26.039
in case nuclear weapons were coming.
Right, that's insane and wouldn't have done

314
00:27:26.039 --> 00:27:27.680
any good, But that's that's what
they put us through to prepare us.

315
00:27:29.039 --> 00:27:32.720
But there was no one who wasn't
aware of it and frightened by it.

316
00:27:32.759 --> 00:27:38.640
Frightened because both sides had nuclear arsenals
large enough to destroy humanity many times over.

317
00:27:40.240 --> 00:27:45.880
That's why it was so important to
keep the Cold War cold. By

318
00:27:45.960 --> 00:27:49.920
the early eighties, about five years
into his service, Hansen was transferred again,

319
00:27:51.279 --> 00:27:55.759
this time to headquarters in Washington,
assigned to the Budget Unit. And

320
00:27:55.799 --> 00:27:59.279
I dealt closely with those people because
they told us about the future. You

321
00:27:59.319 --> 00:28:02.640
know, where we're got money and
how we'd operate it. The Budget Unit

322
00:28:02.759 --> 00:28:07.079
was where David Major, an FBI
counterintelligence agent, first met Hanson. People

323
00:28:07.200 --> 00:28:11.039
never want to be in the budget
unit, but you had to take your

324
00:28:11.039 --> 00:28:15.160
brightest and your best people to do
that because everything revolves around the budget.

325
00:28:15.160 --> 00:28:21.000
And so that's when I met Bob
Hanson. David Major gave Hanson TSSCI clearance.

326
00:28:21.519 --> 00:28:26.000
That jumble of letters stands for Top
Secret Sensitive Compartmented Information. What it

327
00:28:26.160 --> 00:28:32.440
means is access to some of the
government's most guarded secrets. The budget people

328
00:28:32.480 --> 00:28:34.599
are some of the most sensitive important
people in the bureau. There was a

329
00:28:34.640 --> 00:28:38.640
few people who knew everything, and
because he was a budgeteer and an analyst,

330
00:28:38.720 --> 00:28:42.759
he almost knew everything. As such, Hanson could graze on a buffet

331
00:28:42.759 --> 00:28:48.200
of sensitive FBI documents that could be
used for budget justifications. Bob had a

332
00:28:48.279 --> 00:28:52.799
unique way. And you probably know
people like this, But if you started

333
00:28:52.799 --> 00:28:55.640
telling something that you think would be
a secret, you would start to whisper.

334
00:28:56.519 --> 00:29:00.240
I'd say, what are you whispering
for? We're in your office,

335
00:29:00.359 --> 00:29:02.480
We're an FBI headquarters. What do
you whisper? Yeah, yeah, I

336
00:29:02.559 --> 00:29:03.680
know, but let me show you
this. That's literally what he does.

337
00:29:03.799 --> 00:29:08.880
Let me show you this. I'm
saying, stop it. But he would

338
00:29:08.880 --> 00:29:15.480
never do that. He was He's
playing secret squirrel. I guess. Hanson

339
00:29:15.519 --> 00:29:21.359
had a reputation for being nimble with
technology and information, but he was dour,

340
00:29:21.799 --> 00:29:26.160
russ holier than now. Some knew
him as homophobic, almost cartoonishly anti

341
00:29:26.240 --> 00:29:32.680
communist, uber conservative on law and
order. He gained a reputation for aggressively

342
00:29:32.720 --> 00:29:37.440
pushing his Catholic beliefs and was a
regular at pro life marches. Hanson attended

343
00:29:37.519 --> 00:29:41.680
church daily, often the six am
Mass, near his house. Sometimes the

344
00:29:41.759 --> 00:29:48.240
lunchtime Opus Day meeting near FBI headquarters. You go into his office and it's

345
00:29:48.279 --> 00:29:52.640
striking because he had a crucifix on
the wall behind his desk. James Bamford,

346
00:29:52.799 --> 00:29:56.839
a former TV news producer who covered
national security, got to know Hanson

347
00:29:56.960 --> 00:30:02.640
through his work. Over the years, Hanson and Bamford got to be friendly.

348
00:30:02.759 --> 00:30:07.599
Bamford sometimes took Hanson out on his
houseboat. Hanson even attended Bamford's wedding.

349
00:30:07.200 --> 00:30:12.960
Hanson and another mutual friend constantly pressured
Bamford to join Opus Stay and they

350
00:30:14.160 --> 00:30:18.160
kept asking me to come with him
to go to an Opus Stay medium.

351
00:30:18.160 --> 00:30:22.640
I had no interest in it,
but just to keep peace in the family

352
00:30:22.680 --> 00:30:25.279
there. Sort of they kind of
wore you down. Yeah, I said,

353
00:30:25.319 --> 00:30:29.039
okay, fine, okay, we'll
go. Bamford was raised Catholic but

354
00:30:29.319 --> 00:30:33.680
had drifted away. So one night
I went to Opu's day with them and

355
00:30:33.839 --> 00:30:38.440
it was like you know, advanced
Sunday school or something, so you know,

356
00:30:38.720 --> 00:30:41.519
been there, done that. I
thought, Okay, now they kind

357
00:30:41.519 --> 00:30:47.319
of wore tears. Yeah, it's
just not my thing. Regularly attending Opus

358
00:30:47.319 --> 00:30:51.400
Stay meetings in downtown d C may
have had another benefit, for Hanson,

359
00:30:52.240 --> 00:30:57.200
if I was his spy master,
I might suggest that that's a good place

360
00:30:57.240 --> 00:31:04.000
to actually meet socialized with senior level
US government officials. In fact, on

361
00:31:04.119 --> 00:31:10.279
Sundays, Hanson attended the same Northern
Virginia church as Louis Free, director of

362
00:31:10.319 --> 00:31:19.599
the FBI. Hanson did have some
friends in the intelligence community, like Ron

363
00:31:19.640 --> 00:31:26.920
Melotech. I found him an amazing
person, very charismatic, very intelligent,

364
00:31:27.279 --> 00:31:36.000
very well informed about many things,
from politics, current events, international relations,

365
00:31:36.799 --> 00:31:41.559
to religion, theology. That was
our original point of interests religion.

366
00:31:42.319 --> 00:31:47.319
They worked alongside each other in the
late nineteen nineties in the State Department's Office

367
00:31:47.319 --> 00:31:51.880
of Foreign Missions, where Hanson was
the FBI liaison. They'd have lunch once

368
00:31:51.920 --> 00:31:56.759
a week, sometimes would go to
dinner. Melotech found Hanson unfailingly loyal and

369
00:31:57.039 --> 00:32:01.160
generous. He was a guest at
Malone Tech's wedding and ended up volunteering to

370
00:32:01.240 --> 00:32:07.920
videotape the whole thing. At Melo
Tech's suns Bar Mitzvah, Hanson himself performed

371
00:32:07.119 --> 00:32:13.440
a mitzvah. He rescued it.
Observant Orthodox Jews don't use electricity on the

372
00:32:13.480 --> 00:32:17.039
Sabbath, so when the electrical timer
malfunctioned and the lights went out. Bob

373
00:32:17.079 --> 00:32:23.240
Hanson stepped right up and volunteered to
adjust this or to reset the timer so

374
00:32:23.279 --> 00:32:28.240
that the lights would come back on, which was something that no Jewish person

375
00:32:29.039 --> 00:32:34.599
would be allowed to do. He
was a solid citizen, extremely reliable.

376
00:32:35.279 --> 00:32:39.079
This is Paul Moore, an analyst
who's specialty was Chinese espionage. For a

377
00:32:39.160 --> 00:32:45.160
time, Paul and Hanson were carpool
buddies at the FBI. Those who liked

378
00:32:45.160 --> 00:32:50.440
Hanson found something in him that others
didn't. Paul says that Hanson was interested

379
00:32:50.480 --> 00:32:54.960
in life's big questions. Small talk
really wasn't his thing. Would you mind

380
00:32:54.960 --> 00:32:59.160
if I ask you a question?
Oh? Sure, guys, we start.

381
00:33:00.400 --> 00:33:07.200
Do you believe that what you're doing
right now is what God intended for

382
00:33:07.240 --> 00:33:12.720
you to do with your life journalism? Just what you're doing now? Yeah?

383
00:33:13.119 --> 00:33:16.920
Sure, absolutely? Okay, Now
that I didn't ask you that question

384
00:33:16.960 --> 00:33:24.680
because I'm creepy or wants you to
come to our church dinner. But that

385
00:33:25.119 --> 00:33:30.319
little moment where you thought, this
is what is this question? That moment

386
00:33:30.599 --> 00:33:36.839
is something which was experienced by friends
of Bob Hanson as opposed to acquaintances.

387
00:33:37.640 --> 00:33:42.079
Bob was trying to put people on
the right path where he could, and

388
00:33:42.119 --> 00:33:47.640
he would use it as an opening
to a conversational gambit. Hanson bounced around

389
00:33:47.680 --> 00:33:52.240
the bureau's counterintelligence operation, perhaps a
bit more than his peers, but it

390
00:33:52.400 --> 00:33:57.640
was pretty typical for agents to get
promotions and move desks every few years.

391
00:33:58.799 --> 00:34:04.799
The FBI Soviet and Pnalytical Unit provided
Hanson a prime perch entree to a full

392
00:34:04.880 --> 00:34:10.800
array of FBI investigations involving Soviet agents. Hanson an agent supervised analysts who would

393
00:34:10.800 --> 00:34:15.320
take information gathered from the field and
try to make sense of it, try

394
00:34:15.320 --> 00:34:19.440
to piece together the puzzle. Bob
King was one of them. He shared

395
00:34:19.440 --> 00:34:23.719
a cubicle with Hanson and another analyst, So you interacted daily. We interacted

396
00:34:23.800 --> 00:34:29.719
daily. Yes, he would come
across as very cold, and if people

397
00:34:29.760 --> 00:34:36.599
didn't perform the way he thought they
should, he ignored them. Hanson and

398
00:34:36.679 --> 00:34:42.159
King weren't necessarily friends, but they
worked closely together, covering really sensitive stuff

399
00:34:42.639 --> 00:34:47.559
like the identities of Soviet surreptitiously working
for the US and super secret government operations.

400
00:34:49.239 --> 00:34:52.519
If that information got into the wrong
hands, it could be hugely damaging.

401
00:34:53.519 --> 00:34:59.239
King, Hanson and Paul Moore also
went to monthly meetings of Washington's Apple

402
00:34:59.320 --> 00:35:05.760
Computer Club. The club's catchy name
apple Pie, the pie spelled PI.

403
00:35:06.440 --> 00:35:10.599
This was the nineteen eighties and computers
were primitive, but Hanson was fairly adept

404
00:35:10.639 --> 00:35:15.960
with them. Again, Paul Moore, I had just gotten my Apple two

405
00:35:15.119 --> 00:35:20.440
plus computer, and then he said, you know what you really ought to

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00:35:20.519 --> 00:35:24.199
do is study programming language. And
so he showed up with a book on

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00:35:24.719 --> 00:35:30.599
C and C plus and C plus
plus. And what I wanted to use

408
00:35:30.639 --> 00:35:36.599
the computer to do was to find
out how to get through the locked door

409
00:35:37.800 --> 00:35:44.559
on the fourth floor of the mansion
in the Macintosh Adventure game. Hanson's goals

410
00:35:44.599 --> 00:35:47.000
were a little more ambitious. He
was more of a nitty gritty guy.

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00:35:47.719 --> 00:35:53.079
We'd go to the meetings of the
Apple Club in Washington every month, and

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00:35:53.119 --> 00:35:59.320
Bob would peel off and talk to
the guys who wanted to hook up their

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00:35:59.400 --> 00:36:04.719
machines in a siloscope or something like
that. Before Hanson had met Bob King

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00:36:05.039 --> 00:36:08.519
or Paul Moore or Ron Melotech,
he had already turned on them. By

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00:36:08.559 --> 00:36:15.320
the late seventies, Hanson had crossed
the line. We don't know what exactly

416
00:36:15.360 --> 00:36:20.679
pushed him over the edge. Was
it money? Glory that he felt unappreciated

417
00:36:20.679 --> 00:36:24.400
at the FBI. His father the
thrill of it, whatever it was.

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00:36:25.480 --> 00:36:30.440
One day in nineteen seventy nine,
he walked into an enclave of Soviet spies

419
00:36:30.039 --> 00:36:38.360
and made them an offer. In
nineteen seventy nine, Hanson was still relatively

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00:36:38.400 --> 00:36:43.440
new at the FBI, just three
years in. Bonnie and their three kids

421
00:36:43.480 --> 00:36:46.119
were living in a small house in
Westchester County, a bit north of Manhattan.

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00:36:47.000 --> 00:36:52.519
Life was getting expensive and FBI agents
weren't paid more to compensate for living

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00:36:52.519 --> 00:36:59.960
in one of America's priciest cities.
The FBI asked Hanson to create a national

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00:37:00.159 --> 00:37:07.679
counterintelligence database, everything and everyone vital
to the KGB and the GRU, Russian

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00:37:07.719 --> 00:37:15.000
military intelligence. Hansen learned a lot
and quickly inside knowledge of where to find

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00:37:15.119 --> 00:37:22.519
Russian spies on American soil. Among
the key insights, the KGB and GRU

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00:37:22.719 --> 00:37:28.199
used different covers to hide their spies. The Soviet News Agency Test served as

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00:37:28.239 --> 00:37:34.639
a front KGB spies would pose as
journalists. The GRU laundered its spies through

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00:37:34.920 --> 00:37:39.360
Amtorg, a Soviet exporting agency.
If an American company wanted to do business

430
00:37:39.360 --> 00:37:45.360
in the Soviet Union, it almost
always went to Amtorg First. This is

431
00:37:45.400 --> 00:37:52.679
where Hanson's career as a mole officially
began, the moment and place he turned

432
00:37:53.039 --> 00:38:04.760
trader again Gallagher, who worked alongside
Hanson in New York. He was assigned

433
00:38:04.840 --> 00:38:12.639
to the Russian Counterintelligence Division. Not
long after he was assigned, it was

434
00:38:12.679 --> 00:38:19.639
about five months that he walked into
Amtorg Trading Corporation. The Amtorg Trading Corporation

435
00:38:19.840 --> 00:38:22.039
was based in a white, twenty
two story office building on the corner of

436
00:38:22.119 --> 00:38:28.239
Lexington Avenue and fortieth Street in Manhattan, two blocks from Grand Central Terminal and

437
00:38:28.280 --> 00:38:31.480
a few doors down from the Chrysler
Building. Everyone knew what Amtorg was.

438
00:38:31.719 --> 00:38:37.599
Everybody in that division knew what Amtalk
Trading Corporation. And you also knew that

439
00:38:37.719 --> 00:38:45.360
at different facilities around New York there
is very complexity of coverage that anybody who

440
00:38:45.360 --> 00:38:51.719
would walk into a certain facility you
may be subject to a court approved video

441
00:38:51.800 --> 00:38:55.920
coverage of you walking in. He
had to find out that there was no

442
00:38:57.280 --> 00:39:00.639
video coverage at the front door of
AMTRK. So on a fall day,

443
00:39:00.880 --> 00:39:05.840
Hanson took the elevator up to Amtork's
offices, dropped off a letter, and

444
00:39:06.039 --> 00:39:12.719
walked out evading the FBI's watchful eye. It was a brazen but calculated approach.

445
00:39:15.480 --> 00:39:21.840
Not long after Hanson walked into Amtorg
to offer his services, someone was

446
00:39:21.880 --> 00:39:28.400
on to him and eventually caught him
red handed in his own home. It

447
00:39:28.519 --> 00:39:35.400
wasn't the FEDS. The person who
caught him was his wife. That's next

448
00:39:35.400 --> 00:39:43.119
time on Agent of Betrayal, The
Double Life of Robert Hansen. This series

449
00:39:43.199 --> 00:39:47.039
was reported by me Major, Garrett
Arden Farry, and Sarah Cook. Our

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00:39:47.079 --> 00:39:52.239
team of reporters and producers also includes
Jamie Benson, Pat Milton, Jake Rosen,

451
00:39:52.400 --> 00:39:58.840
and Ellie Watson. Our producing partner
is Neon Hummedia. Our senior producer

452
00:39:58.920 --> 00:40:04.719
is Odelia Rubin. Zoe Culkin is
our associate producer. Original music and sound

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00:40:04.719 --> 00:40:10.159
designed by Hansdale. She additional music
from Blue Dot Sessions. Executive producers for

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00:40:10.280 --> 00:40:16.000
Agent of Betrayal are Ardent Fari,
Sherah Morris, and me Major Garrett Special

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00:40:16.039 --> 00:40:21.800
thanks to Mark Lima, Megan Marcus, ingrid Cyprian Matthews and Steve Racy's of

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00:40:21.840 --> 00:40:39.480
CBS News and Jonathan Hirsch of Neon
Hammedia. Thanks for listening. That was

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00:40:39.519 --> 00:40:44.840
a preview of Agent of Betrayal.
The Double Life of Robert Hanson from CBS

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00:40:44.880 --> 00:40:47.679
News. Head over to the feed
Now for a new episode and hear new

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00:40:47.679 --> 00:40:52.480
episodes on Thursdays, available wherever you
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