Gotcha! The CIA's most embarrassing turncoat is nabbed in Stockholm

A daring escape from an fbi surveillance team one sticky New Mexico night in 1985 demonstrated Edward Lee Howard's mastery of the spy trade he learned at the Central Intelligence Agency. With his wife at the wheel, Howard propped up a dummy in the passenger seat and, on a tight turn, rolled out onto the roadway. Months later he surfaced in Moscow, the only full-fledged CIA operator to defect during the cold war. The fugitive double agent eventually showed up in Stockholm and last week was arrested by Swedish authorities.

The CIA erred grievously by ignoring Howard's drug and alcohol abuse when it picked him to spy in Moscow, the most sensitive of cold war assignments. In a major violation of procedures designed to compartmentalize any one officer's knowledge, Howard was allowed to learn of practically all the major intelligence operations in the Soviet capital. Agency insiders say several CIA agents were caught and executed and that Howard "virtually wiped out the Moscow station." Despite the absence of an extradition treaty for spying, the Justice Department says it is "determined" to bring Howard to trial in the U.S.