…...the famous quote from “All the Presidents’ Men,” uttered by Deep Throat, exasperated that Bob Woodward couldn’t fathom why these men would be so bad at burglary.
The story behind the cops who caught them is almost as interesting.
.
Think you know everything about Watergate? Leave it to a barman to add a surprising twist to Washington's most enduring story.
On Friday, June 16, 1972, the annual assault of heat and humidity on Washington had already begun. An undercover DC police vehicle, a light-blue 1972 four-door Ford—car #727—was cruising Georgetown with Sergeant
Paul W. Leeper and officers
John B. Barrett and
Carl M. Shoffler, all dressed as hippies, on the lookout for street criminals doing drug deals and the like. It was best to approach possible criminals in an unremarkable car and disheveled civilian clothing.
[...]
It’s a tale that begins where all too many end: in a bar, this one not far from the Watergate and a favorite among police.
When the Watergate call first came from the dispatcher, Officer Shoffler radioed back, reluctantly taking the case. The address was not their primary responsibility—why wasn’t squad car 80, the vehicle responsible for the area, answering? The reply came back that car 80 was “temporarily out of service.”
[...]
Actually, squad car 80 was not out of gas. But the uniformed police officer who drove it was definitely out of service—at least according to a co-owner of PW’s Saloon, Bill Lacey.
• • •
The guard that night, Frank Wills—after removing the tape only to find it replaced 20 minutes later—had phoned in a report of “suspicious circumstances” to DC police just before 2 am.
[...]
Across the street in the Howard Johnson’s Motor Lodge, a “spotter” for the burglars, Alfred C. Baldwin III, was glued to the TV watching a horror movie, Attack of the Puppet People, on Channel 20—oblivious to the situation developing across the street. Baldwin was holed up in a disheveled seventh-floor room with a window facing the Watergate.
[...]
“Well,” Baldwin said, “you’ve got a problem because there are hippie-looking guys who’ve got guns.”
The Burglars: Barker, McCord, Sturgis, Martinez, and Gonzalez.
It was some time before it was shortened to its infamous moniker, “Watergate.”
jfk.hood.edu/… for more on Barrett