In this article I present a letter (updated) concerning covert domestic assault of American citizens by elements connected to the Department of Defense. I have emailed, hand-delivered and/or faxed this letter (or earlier versions) to the chairs of the United States Select Committee on Intelligence, to Senators Feinstein, Feingold, Boxer and to the ACLU.

To whom it may concern,

My name is David Astin. This letter concerns evidence of covert domestic assault of American citizens by elements connected to the Department of Defense in the United States. This letter is being generated using earlier versions of this letter, corrections to these versions, and related letters.

In this letter I contend that in February 2001 I contacted the National Security Agency (NSA) by telephone regarding observations indicating possible industrial espionage and related activity occurring since October 2000 at my then residence and office (workshop/lab) located in Santa Monica California; that I provided my name, social security number and reason for calling so that the NSA could "open a file"; that prior to contacting the NSA I contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in West Los Angeles to which I provided my observations; that, beginning in February 2001, I was repeatedly assaulted and driven from my residence/office in Santa Monica; that trade secrets constituting inventions were illegally obtained from me; that these events have had a profound impact on my life and career; that I am able to produce strong and compelling evidence that elements connected to the Department of Defense were responsible for this assault and other related events; and that core aspects of the evidence that I am able to provide touch on at least two issues that are clearly sensitive in terms of national security.

Hereafter, in this document, I will use the term "sensitive" so as to include the concepts of "clearly sensitive" and "likely sensitive" unless otherwise specified. And, in this document, "residence and office (workshop/lab)" will also be referred to as "home/office," "home/shop" or "shop."

I am in a difficult position as far as reporting evidence regarding the claims that I make in this document. The primary reason for the difficulty, mentioned above, is that "core aspects" of the evidence include information that is clearly sensitive in that if publicly expressed could have a negative impact on national security. This puts me in the position of having to be circumspect in my description of these events. Some of the evidence that is not, in and of itself, sensitive can 'point to' sensitive information or, in my judgment, could compromise efforts to expose these activities thus I am being cautious about what I state in this document. I am aware that in order for the appropriate senate committee to begin to consider hearing my evidence initial credible evidence of the claims that I am making must be provided. Eliciting responses to, and providing date-substantiated recordation of, my claims are two of the objectives of this document and earlier related documents.

As of the writing of this document (May 20, 2006), I have not been questioned or approached by law enforcement or by any other public official in an openly-identified manner regarding this matter.

In connection with the events that I briefly describe in this document I am deeply concerned about President Bush's choice of Michael Hayden as the next director of the CIA considering the above referred evidence that I am able to produce indicating NSA participation in covert domestic assault of American citizens from the years 2001 to 2005. I am also concerned about lack of Congressional oversight of NSA 'Special Access Projects' due lack of proper security clearances on the part of those in Congress charged with this duty. And specifically, I am concerned that former NSA employee Russ Tice has (to my knowledge) not been able to testify to the Senate Intelligence Committee in regards to possible NSA 'Special Access Project' abuses. The preceding point is of particular concern because of a general understanding that I have of the focus of Tice's work at the NSA through published reports (news articles) indicating that Tice's 'whistleblowing' may (possibly) have a direct relationship to the allegations that I am making in this document.

Initially, at the time of the alleged assault, I had been working on multiple projects simultaneously at the 2310 28th Street location. There is strong indication that trade secrets connected with one project were illegally obtained by a company in southern California (see Note 1) and that technical insights constituting an invention (see Note 2) relating to a second project were taken with the implication that I would not receive credit for my work although it was my choice to willingly provide information about the second project to our government in the interest of national security.

I am a non-degreed engineer and inventor. My work generally draws from wide variety of fields and areas of study that include aspects of electronics and applied physics. In October 2000, in what appears to be a response to my communication with another company, I became aware that industrial espionage may be occurring at my home/office located at 2310 28th Street in Santa Monica California; I then further investigated this possibility which yielded additional indication that theft of trade secrets may have in fact occurred and may have been ongoing; this included the possible use of 'TEMPEST' technology [ specifically, surveillance equipment utilized to receive and make intelligible electromagnetic emissions from computer systems ]. I subsequently informed local law enforcement who referred me to federal authorities. I contacted federal authorities which included the FBI and later the NSA. By about late February 2001 it became apparent to me that federal authorities and/or operatives for federal authorities, hereafter referred to as "federal authorities," had arrived. However I came to this conclusion by observation and was never contacted in what I would consider a "direct manner" with one exception; a person who I have known for many years who had contacts at, and a relationship with, the Department of Defense; I will refer to this person with the pseudonym "Bob." [ On and about February 19th 2001 I contacted Bob concerning assistance in this matter and he informed me that he was no longer working with DoD but that he would see what he could do to help. The above referred "observation" comprises detailed descriptions that I am not presently including in this document.]

Beginning in Jan/Feb 2001 I received threatening letters: (1) A posted hardcopy letter from a hotel/motel located in Santa Monica; the letter using very specific/unique terminology that I would regularly use. The letter was, from my view, seemingly "well thought out," having a coherence, but an 'odd rambling' using the aforementioned terminology and requesting that I rent my house while leaving all of the contents in the house; the letter was signed "Sindy Hawke". And, (2), a note from a small 'spiral-bound' note-pad placed on my mailbox, asking me to please consider the offer in the first letter. Also at this point numerous important pieces of mail (hardcopy) did not arrive thus causing disruption. In addition there where other "unusual 'activities' "occurring at my home/shop that I am not presently detailing here in this document.

I was subjected to harassment that included [what clearly appeared to be] a threatening request for aspects of my work by 'door to door' sales people; a sequence of events then unfolded into what I would characterize as culminating in "a dispute" with federal authorities (the details of which touch an issue that is clearly 'sensitive') [ The prior sentence is an incomplete characterization of a complicated sequence of events that comprise key events that took place during this period of time (Feb/Mar/Apr 2001) many of the details of which I am intentionally not writing about (here) or am being circumspect about in my description of ]. The "'door to door' sales people" comprised three sets of sales people over approximately a 10 day time-span. At my home/office this, in and of itself, is unusual as the only sales people that I recall seeing in 10 years, up until this time, at this location were my yearly visit from "Santa Monicans for Renters' Rights" and the occasional visit from the Jehovah's Witnesses. The first two visits that I will describe were from two males each time, one of these being the same person both times, who were "selling magazines" for the local high school. The man who was present during both of these visits did most of the talking during both visits and he first introduced himself to me with an unusual name; the name is a name that is not commonly used, if at all, by what appeared to me to be his ethnic group; the name was voiced such that it sounded like two words, Bob's actual name and the word "tell"; that is "Bob tell". Immediately after he told me his name, he said (with a manner strongly suggestive of the idea that "there was something more 'to get'") "funny name, huh" and then he repeated the name in the same way as before. I asked him what he was selling but he did not seem very interested in selling anything to me and instead, he asked me "how is your work going," and I said "it has been difficult." He then told me to "just hang in there for a little while longer" and "to keep working." The conversations during both of these visits centered around telling me to "just keep working" and to "just hang in there" without any significant focus on selling anything. The third visit was from a man asking for donations for "Vietnam Veterans"; he opened a folder with approximately eight 20 dollar bills fanned across one side [ the estimate of "approximately twenty 20 dollar bills" in earlier documents is too high, the number is closer to a minimum of eight 20 dollar bills because you could see the "20" from each bill under the adjacent bill and there was what appeared to be under an inch between each bill edge at the top of the arc of the 'fanning' of bills ] ; he rapidly rendered a sales-pitch and after he had finished I told him that I was very low on money and thus could not donate right now but that as soon as I was able to that I would donate; he kindly acknowledged, he thanked me, and then his demeanor radically changed and he angrily said "we better get what we want" and then walked a away 'in a huff.' During this above referred "10 day time-span" what I would describe as a vapor or gas, having a smell that I have not been able to identify, began to fill the airspace in my shop causing my eyes and lungs to have a strong and painful burning sensation and causing significant disruption to my work. I tried to isolate the source and remedy the problem to no avail.

My shop was then entered with clear indications that documents (paper documents) had been examined. I was subjected to what I would plainly characterize as "violent assault" that included the use of volatile chemicals; I will not detail the exact nature of the assault here in this document. The harassment and assault continued; it appeared to me at the time that a possible objective was to bring an end to my life and certainly there was no way to remain in my shop. In the course of telephone conversations with Bob in February/March/April 2001, he suggested to me that I was in trouble for "trying to do business with a known spy." Bob explained to me that there was nothing that he could do, that I should "just try to stay alive" and many other details including, at a later date, instructions that I was to move all of my materials into storage with the qualification that "you can take your books" but that "you should not take your laptop computer"; that "the laptop must remain in storage." The storage location is located at Westwood Self Storage; I have not entered this unit since depositing the remaining contents of my shop into this unit however I have reason to believe that the unit may have been accessed and some of its contents altered and/or destroyed. I was also informed by Bob that "you will never get credit for your work". These conversations, and subsequent conversations, with Bob where extensive, explicit and detailed in a manner that strongly indicates that Bob was, in effect, acting on instructions from the parties responsible for the assault. After many weeks of "fighting it out," trying to remain in my shop, I left to stay at my mother's house; actually this happened in a manner where I came back to my shop and tried to resume work and was repeatedly forced out. My shop remained abandoned for months with me only returning for a few minutes at a time in order to feed my cats. To my knowledge, the address 2310 28th Street no longer exists; the units 2308 and 2310 were combined to form the address 2308.

Intermittent harassment and assault has continued up until recently, some examples include being 'drugged'; verbally-delivered threats to my own well being and well being of loved ones; disappearance of emails from Bob and unauthorized access to one of my voice messaging systems. To reiterate, these are examples that constitute a small portion of the harassment and assault that I am alleging occurred. It appeared that Bob tried to get the assault to stop, and subsequently Bob clearly appeared to have been assaulted in such a manner so as to discredit him. I have known Bob since childhood and he has always been of sound mind, dependable and honest. However, after summer of 2001 Bob began to display signs of extremely unusual personality changes. It became clear to me, given the context and given Bob's history, that it was likely that Bob was being assaulted by use of drugs and other means designed so as to initially mimic mental illness and possibly cause a decay into actual mental illness. This is not the Bob that I have known for more than thirty years. Part of the aforementioned "context" is that something similar was clearly attempted on me during the assault described in this document but due to a number of factors, including what I would describe as the crude and overt nature of the initial assault activity acting as a type of warning, these attempts did not have the effect of significantly undermining my psyche; but imagine the vulnerability of a person in a situation where that person has little or no idea that such nefarious activity is underway. I have had to remain "very 'controlled'" during this entire ordeal, and in the case of Bob it has been especially painful. By my estimation the apparent assault of Bob was likely motivated because Bob was able to identify, to name, the person or persons who contacted him in connection with the events in combination with Bob's relationship with me and the possibile factor that Bob may have made efforts to cause the assault to cease. [ The sentence placed here in the 051706 version of this document delivered to Senator Dianne Feinstein and the ACLU was inaccurate and has been removed from this document. It was incorrectly presumed, for reasons not detailed here, that Bob began working in connection with DoD again after summer 2001.]. As of the 030606 writing of this document [ prior document ] Bob was no longer talking with me directly about these events and in conversations with Bob prior to 030606 he appeared to be frightened; it appeared that he had been somehow threatened.

An important question for me to state my awareness of, and a question that persons reading this document would likely ask, is "why has the assault that I allege been essentially non-lethal?" I do not know the answer to the aforementioned question however I firmly believe that I am able to provide useful information in connection with answering this question although it is not a requirement that this question initially be answered in light of evidence that I am able to provide (see last paragraph of this document).

I have been reduced to survival; being cautious about many aspects of my life. My outward manifest productivity has dropped to near zero. These events have had a profound impact on my life and career. I write this letter with the understanding that there is likely significant risk to my personal safety involved. I love my country; and what I have seen makes me realize that because of my nature I have no choice but to continue to try to report to the proper authority about these crimes including the possibility that sensitive information related to our national security has been compromised. Following is partial summary of a letter that I have tried to disseminate to senators, public officials, the ACLU and to the press. I have, thus far, not received any response.

My name is David Astin. I am a non-degreed engineer and inventor. I am able to produce strong and compelling evidence that elements connected to the Department of Defense are involved in domestic harassment, assault and possible assassination of American citizens; this concerns issues that are sensitive that cannot be made public at the present time. I am trying to establish 'safe passage' to the Senate Intelligence Committee where I can provide the aforementioned evidence.

David A. Astin
052006 Los Angeles, California

Note 1) Encrypted descriptive string: rxojjhrnsdkiazggkeqrbmdhzxhm
Note 2) Description of an invention having potential significant
military and civilian applications (description not provided in this document).