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Summary
Summary
Martin Kaiser is a legend within the nation's covert electronic surveillance fraternity. With a hot-wired transmitter the size of a pea, Kaiser built devices that could bring down a government, prevent a terrorist attack, or provide blackmail for a government agency to smear a well-known American Civil Rights leader. Now, in Odyssey of an Eavesdropper, he steps from the shadows of national security to tell his own story-a journey from an abusive childhood in a Pennsylvania coal-mining townto icon status in the black ops world of U.S. spy operations as the premier producer of electronic surveillance gadgets and dirty tricks, and then his battle for professional and emotional survival with the FBI bent on his destruction. Kaiser's clients included the FBI, the CIA, DEA, Secret Service, Army, Navy and Air Force Intelligence, as well as foreign intelligence services. However, as a result of his testimony before the National Wiretap Commission in 1975, the FBI began a vendetta againstKaiser, nearly driving his business into bankruptcy and resulting in his eventual indictment on charge of illegal wiretapping, conspiracy and transporting an illegal eavesdropping device across state lines. Acquitted of all charges and having reinvented himself, Kaiser tells his tale.
Author Notes
Martin L. Kaiser III is President of Martin L. Kaiser Inc., an electronics company located in Cockeysville, Maryland, specializing in the manufacture of electronic eavesdropping devices, bomb detection, and improvised explosive device detection equipment. He was a senior research technician at RCA Laboratories in Princeton, New Jersey, in the late l950s and early 1960s where he was instrumental in the development of a new link in the U.S. anti-missile system. He has served as a technical advisor on films including "The Conversation," "Enemy of the State," the TV show, "The Matrix" and he was featured in the BBC Emmy Award-Winning documentary, "Confessions of a Dangerous Man," in the l980s about the life of fugitive CIA agent, Frank Terpil.
Robert S. Stokes is the author of the novel Walking Wounded and the play A Place Called Heartbreak. He covered the Vietnam War and the Chicago Seven trial for Newsweek and the Attica Prison Riot for Life magazine. Mr. Stokes lives in Westport, CT.
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Modesty aside," says electronic surveillance expert Kaiser, "I was to the FBI, and the CIA, and the rest of the intel community, what `Q'-the British Secret Service technical genius-was to James Bond." And Kaiser, who consulted on the 1998 film Enemy of the State, which he says is loosely based on his story, first made his name in the late 1950s and early '60s, when he helped develop a missile-directing system. Eventually he began making "bugs" for the FBI and CIA as well as private companies. But after his 1975 testimony before the House of Representatives about his work in government intelligence, the FBI, he says, came after him. He was indicted for illegal wiretapping and other crimes, and while he was acquitted on all charges, his business was ruined and he suffered an emotional breakdown that he attributes, in part, to childhood abuse. Kaiser ends the book with a chapter about the lack of privacy in America today-and while some of his warnings seem alarmist, his background will make readers of this compelling and sympathetic book (written with journalist and novelist Stokes) think twice. Agent, Bob Diforio. (Jan. 10) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
The CEO of a Maryland electronics company specializing in eavesdropping and explosives detection equipment tells of spooks, dirty tricks and vengeful federal agents. Kaiser recounts two stories with the help of novelist/journalist Stokes. The first, and more engaging, is a chronicle of the evolution from the 1960s onward of electronic eavesdropping technology and applications. It's couched in a tone suggesting the reader doesn't suspect half of what's been going on, an attitude buttressed by an appendix detailing surveillance techniques and countermeasures. The second story is the author's personal account of what he alleges was a harrowing, long-term FBI campaign against him. A steady supplier of listening devices and countermeasures to a dummy company used by the Bureau for such purchases, Kaiser was called to testify during a 1975 congressional probe into questionable activities. His revelation under oath that the FBI was illegally inflating cost figures set Hoover's minions on a trail of revenge, he asserts. The vendetta culminated in Kaiser's indictment for the illegal wiretapping of two FBI agents during an investigation of bank fraud. He was acquitted of all charges but had to deal with a civil suit by the two agents (they were taped using equipment Kaiser had installed for the bank). That suit, he avers, nearly cost him his business, his marriage and his mental health; after eight years, his insurance company forced him to settle out of court. Kaiser's narrative contains some entertaining revelations about his adventures running countermeasure "sweeps" for both government and corporate clients, but redundant protestations of innocence, allegations of persecution and a persistent air of overblown self-importance drag down too many of these pages. Laborious diatribe against the Feds, with little evidence other than Kaiser's say-so. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Library Journal Review
Unlike Patrick Radden Keefe's recent Chatter: Dispatches from the Secret World of Global Eavesdropping, this book is by a true insider. Kaiser was involved with the FBI at the height of illegal federal surveillance in the 1960s and 1970s. He details his beginnings as an RCA technician and his stints building eavesdropping devices under contract to the FBI, CIA, DEA, and a host of other domestic and foreign security agencies. The results are truly fascinating, with lurid details about spying by the Soviets, the FBI, and rogue ex-agents. The crux of the book is Kaiser's 1975 expos?, in testimony to the National Wiretap Commission, of FBI misdeeds, which he says triggered years of retribution by the agency and its proxies. After a nervous breakdown and the near failure of his business, the author turned to presiding over a company that makes eavesdropping devices and bomb detection equipment. His cautionary tale includes detailed advice on the use of bugging equipment and how to detect and avoid surveillance. He was also a consultant to films such as The Conversation, The Matrix, and Enemy of the State and describes how his expertise helped make the movies more realistic. Highly recommended.-Harry Charles, Attorney at Law, St. Louis (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Table of Contents
| Introduction | p. ix |
| Prologue | p. xv |
| Part 1 The Early Years | |
| Chapter 1 Early Survival Lessons | p. 1 |
| Chapter 2 Getting Serious About Electronics | p. 14 |
| Part 2 The New King of Electronic Countermeasures | |
| Chapter 3 Stumbling into the Spy Racket | p. 33 |
| Chapter 4 The Michelangelo of Electronic Surveillance | p. 56 |
| Chapter 5 An Audience with J. Edgar Hoover | p. 71 |
| Chapter 6 A Fateful Meeting | p. 83 |
| Chapter 7 My Anwar Sadat Cadillac | p. 91 |
| Chapter 8 Road to Ruin | p. 106 |
| Chapter 9 Payback | p. 128 |
| Part 3 Trial by Fire | |
| Chapter 10 A Gathering Storm | p. 141 |
| Chapter 11 The Trial | p. 158 |
| Chapter 12 More Trials and Survival Strategies | p. 167 |
| Chapter 13 Searching for Bugs in Corporate America | p. 180 |
| Chapter 14 Civil Suit and Countersuit | p. 189 |
| Chapter 15 The Aftermath | p. 202 |
| Chapter 16 "Enemy of the State" | p. 211 |
| Chapter 17 Looking Back | p. 220 |
| Part 4 The Road Ahead | |
| Chapter 18 The Future of Privacy in America-Or What's Left of It | p. 233 |
| Appendix Audio Surveillance and Countermeasures | p. 249 |
| Glossary of Terms | p. 288 |
| Endnotes | p. 294 |
| Acknowledgments | p. 305 |
| Index | p. 307 |
| About the Authors | p. 312 |
