A lawsuit filed in 1986 by two journalists represented by the Christic Institute showed that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and other parties were engaged in criminal acts, including financing the purchase of arms with the proceeds of cocaine sales. Senator John Kerry's 1988 U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations report on Contra drug links concludes that members of the U.S. State Department "who provided support for the Contras are involved in drug trafficking... and elements of the Contras themselves knowingly receive financial and material assistance from drug traffickers." The report further states that "the Contra drug links include... payments to drug traffickers by the U.S. State Department of funds authorized by the Congress for humanitarian assistance to the Contras, in some cases after the traffickers had been indicted by federal law enforcement agencies on drug charges, in others while traffickers were under active investigation by these same agencies." In 1996, journalist Gary Webb published reports in the San Jose Mercury News, and later in his book Dark Alliance, detailing how Contras, with the assistance of the U.S. government had distributed crack cocaine into Los Angeles to fund weapons purchases. Webb's premise regarding the US Government connection was initially attacked at the time by the corporate media. It is now widely accepted that Webb's main assertion of government "knowledge of drug operations, and collaboration with and protection of known drug traffickers" was correct. In 1998, CIA Inspector General Frederick Hitz published a two-volume report that while seemingly refuting Webb's claims of knowledge and collaboration in its conclusions did not deny them in its body. Hitz went on to admit CIA improprieties in the affair in testimony to a House congressional committee. Mainstream media has since reversed its position on Webb's work acknowledging his contribution to exposing a scandal it had ignored. According to Rodney Campbell, an editorial assistant to Nelson Rockefeller, during World War II, the United States Navy, concerned that strikes and labor disputes in U.S. eastern shipping ports would disrupt wartime logistics, released the mobster Lucky Luciano from prison, and collaborated with him to help the mafia take control of those ports. Labor union members were terrorized and murdered as a means of preventing labor unrest and ensuring smooth shipping of supplies to Europe.[129] In order to prevent Communist party members from being elected in Italy following World War II, the CIA worked closely with the Sicilian Mafia, protecting them and assisting in their worldwide heroin smuggling operations in exchange for the mafia's assistance with assassinating, torturing, and beating leftist political organizers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs