Robert Eringer
Robert Eringer, born October 5, 1954, is an author, investigative journalist and private-sector counterintelligence operative. Salon magazine described Eringer as an "obscure journalist" with ties to Clair George, the former Deputy Director of Operations of the CIA. Eringer freelanced for the FBI's Foreign Counter-Intelligence Division to assist with the apprehension of Edward Lee Howard, an ex-CIA officer who defected to the Soviet Union in 1985. In this ruse, Eringer commissioned Howard to write the Spy's Guide to Central Europe. Eringer describes his assignments for the FBI, which also included keeping tabs on Ira Einhorn, in his book Ruse: Undercover with FBI Counterintelligence.
Career
In 1976, "Bilderberg File: The Men Who Rule the World?" was published in the UK magazine, Verdict, commencing Eringer's journalism career. Research for the book that later followed, The Global Manipulators, led to professional relationship with Dr. Carroll Quigley, the author of Tragedy and Hope, and Eringer sat-in on Quigley's Western Civilizations course at Georgetown University in 1976. In 1978, Eringer completed coursework at the University Southern California in International Relations. The graduate-level program included field-trips to places such as the U.S. Army Russian Institute in Garmisch, Germany, which led to his writing a feature article, "U.S. agents learn ropes at 'school of spies'", for the Toronto Star. Subsequent undercover journalism led to damaging exposé magazine articles to the Liberty Lobby, "The Force of Willis Carto" was published in Mother Jones, and he went undercover to expose Ku Klux Klan activity in Europe for The Sunday People.Controversies
Pottker et al. v Feld et al.
As a Washington D. C. based literary agent and book consultant in the 1990s, Eringer found himself working a controversial assignment for Clair George, a former Deputy Director of Operations of the CIA who was convicted on one count and later pardoned in the Iran-Contra scandal. In 1990, a celebrity journalist, Janice Pottker, published an 11,000 word article about the Feld family in Regardie's magazine. Upon reading, Kenneth Feld took umbrage to her portrayal of his parents and hired Clair George as a consultant to mitigate damages that the proposed book might cause the family and business. George in turn, assigned Eringer to distract the author by encouraging her to write about other topics. Pottker suspects that the unauthorized Feld family biography became an untouchable topic in literary circles, but two of Pottker's books, Crisis in Candyland and Celebrity Washington, were published during this time period. In 1999, Pottker sued for $60 million, claiming, "invasion of privacy, fraud and infliction of mental distress." Citing ongoing litigation, Feld Entertainment refrained from commenting for the May 4, 2003, 60 Minutes feature and the outcome of Pottker et al. v. Feld et al. appears to be unresolved or sealed as of October 2014. However, Pottker informed the St. Petersberg Times that she has "no plans to write about Feld or Ringling Bros. ever again."On January 18, 2004, the St. Petersburg Times retrospectively reported that Janice Pottker had filed a complaint against the Feld family, Clair George, and Robert Eringer in 1999, seeking $120 million for invasion of privacy, interference in business relationships, infliction of emotional distress, fraud, conspiracy and breach of contractual obligations. Pottker filed the lawsuit after discovering that Ken Feld and Clair George paid Eringer to "...to steer her away from stories on Feld..." and prevent Pottker's proposed book, "Highwire" an unauthorized biography of Irvin Feld and the Feld family from being published. "I interviewed this man once in 1988, and I feel as if he's been stalking me ever since," Pottker said of Kenneth Feld.
Monaco
Eringer vacationed in the Principality of Monaco throughout the 1980s and wrote Monaco Cool, while living in Monaco for two years. He returned to reside in Monaco on behalf of a private intelligence client in 1994 and 1995. In late 1999, Prince Albert II, the hereditary prince, commissioned Eringer for a report on a Monaco-based Russian businessman named Alexey Fedorichev; subsequently, the reigning monarch, Prince Rainier III, declined to allow Fedorichev to invest in ASM, Monaco's football club. While completing ongoing counterintelligence activities for the FBI, Eringer's additional intelligence reports on Russian activities in Monaco led to a full-time retainer on June 16, 2002, as Prince Albert's intelligence adviser.Power struggle in the Monarchy
Upon ascension in 2005, Prince Albert II announced that Monaco would shed W. Somerset Maugham's moniker of, "a sunny place for shady people." In his accession speech, the Prince declared that he would fight with all of his strength to ensure that money-laundering and Monaco would no longer be synonyms in the common vernacular. The declaration caused an expansion of Eringer's scope of responsibilities, the Prince commissioned Eringer to create and direct Monaco's first intelligence service. One of the Monaco Intelligence Service's early recommendations was to deny the renewal of Sir Mark Thatcher's residency card due to a troubling background check. In addition to investigations, Eringer's MIS established inter-governmental liaison relationships with twenty foreign intelligence services, including the CIA and the Secret Intelligence Service.Prince Albert II's original anti-corruption cabinet appointments did not last long. As described by Nice RendezVous, MIS vetted Cabinet Director, Jean-Luc Allavena was dismissed in November 2006, and replaced in favor of the serving General Secretariat, Georges Lisimachio. An attempt to dismiss Eringer was made in 2006; however, Prince Albert asked him to remain, limiting his scope of operations to international intelligence liaison relationships. MIS was funded without incident throughout 2007, but Eringer's invoice for Quarter 1, 2008, went unpaid, calls and correspondence went unanswered for the remainder of the year.
Eringer filed a lawsuit for €340,000 in unpaid wages and severance in 2009, initially Monaco lawyers denied his employment, but after 100 pages of supporting evidence were presented to the court, the lawyers were forced to rescind their denial. The Palace of Monaco portrayed the court case as a blackmail attempt to "exploit the US judicial system to generate publicity to forward his extortionist agenda" by a "shakedown artist". Eringer has been described as having mythomania by Stéphane Bern, the author of Grace Kelly, criticized for promoting conspiracy theories and called a "false spy". In 2011, it was reported that Eringer was writing an "anti-Monaco" blog.
Results of Monaco litigation
Lawyers for the Palace of Monaco publicly called Eringer a shakedown artist when he originally sued for $60,000 to recover back-wages and expenditures. Eringer however, had already filed a thirty-four page declaration, detailing his duties and findings with the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Barbara, on October 5, 2009.The Superior Court of California ruled that "because all of Eringer's services were governmental, employing him was not a commercial act exempt from FSIA immunity." According to a court judgment filed on July 10, 2013, the U.S. District Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's original ruling. The court determined that "according to his own attorneys and affidavit, Eringer's assignments" for the Principality were "not the type of employment private parties can undertake" and therefore fell within the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976.
In 2011, Eringer was ordered by the Tribunal de grande instance de Paris to remove defamatory illustrations, photographs, and blog posts of and about Prince Albert II, lawyer Thierry Lacoste, chief of administration and accountant Claude Palmero, and chief of police André Muhlberger from his blog. In September 2012, the French justice system found Eringer guilty of criminal defamation and insult.
Ultimately, the two parties sued each other to a standstill, Eringer's suit to recover wages and expenses against the Prince and Principality is moot under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 and Monaco's defamation and insult suit is moot under the SPEECH Act.