On March 24, 1971, I became the first reporter to inform readers that the FBI wanted the American people to think there was an “FBI agent behind every mailbox.” That rather alarming alert came from stolen FBI files I had found in my own mailbox at The Washington Post when I arrived at work the previous morning. ¶ It was the return address on the big tan envelope that prompted me to open it first: “Liberty Publications, Media, PA.”

I had worked at the Evening Bulletin in Philadelphia before coming to The Post in January 1970, so I knew of Media, a small town southwest of Philadelphia. ¶ The letter inside the envelope informed me that on the night of March 8, 1971, my anonymous correspondents — they called themselves the Citizens Commission to Investigate the FBI — had broken into the Media FBI office and stolen every file. They did so, I learned later, in the dark and as the sounds of the first Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier boxing match filled the streets.

“Enclosed you will find,” the letter said, “copies of certain files from the Media, Pennsylvania, office of the FBI which were removed by our commission for public scrutiny. We are making these copies available to you and to several other persons in public life because we feel that you have shown concern and courage as regards issues which are, in part, documented in the enclosed materials.”

I wasn’t aware of having shown any courage, but I was, to put it mildly, eager to read those files — 14, as it turned out, of 1,000 files that they had taken.

For 43 years the people who sent those files to me then have remained unknown to the general public. This week, five of the Media FBI burglars — a group that pulled off an act that led to congressional investigations of all intelligence agencies, congressional oversight and significant reforms in the FBI — are coming forward for the first time.

In a book I have written and in “1971,” a documentary film by Johanna Hamilton, the burglars tell their story — the ultimate result of a chance encounter I had at a dinner party in 1989 with acquaintances in Philadelphia, who told me they were involved in the Media burglary.

Read more from this story HERE.

Documents released Friday reveal Port Authority officials were warned a plan to reduce lanes on the GW Bridge, which was apparently executed by members of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s staff as an act of political revenge, could be a “potential disaster” for commuters.

However, they pressed on with it anyway for four days, while fielding angry complaints from police and officials in Fort Lee that emergency response in the city was being hampered and residents could not get to work.

The over 1,000 pages of documents were released as part of New Jersey legislative committee’s investigation into the incident. They mostly involve the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the agency that runs the bridge.

The documents did not implicate Christie in the lane closures.

The case became a full-blown scandal on Wednesday, when a set of emails and text messages were released suggesting the lanes were closed by a top Christie aide to apparently punish Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich for not endorsing Christie for re-election.

Read more from this story HERE.