Help Yourself! … a Story of FBI Corruption

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Summary: What happens when an inventor creates technology the government depends on—then loses it all when he speaks out about how it’s being used? In this episode of Newsgram, we explore the remarkable true story behind Help Yourself! A Story of FBI Corruption by Martin Kaiser. A self-taught electronics expert, Marty Kaiser developed tools used by intelligence agencies and bomb squads—including the device that helped uncover the Watergate bugs but after testifying before Congress, Kaiser says everything changed. Contracts disappeared. His business unraveled. From his early innovations to the events that helped inspire Enemy of the State, this is a firsthand account of invention, integrity, and consequences.

Welcome to this edition of Newsgram!

What happens when an inventor creates technology the government depends on and then loses it all when he speaks out? Today we are going to dive into the book Help Yourself! A Story of FBI Corruption by Martin Kaiser, a self-taught electronics expert whose work helped uncover the Watergate bugs and whose story inspired the film Enemy of the State with Gene Hackman and Will Smith.

Marty Kaiser – I was deeply involved in the movie Enemy of the State. Jerry Bruckheimer saw an article about the, what the heck was it? Oh, the NSA, and how the NSA functioned. And he said, we’ve got to do a movie about this. We’ve got to connect it to the rest of us in society. So, I sold a debugging kit to, I can’t remember Andy’s last name, at Disney Productions. The two of them got together, and they said, we tie the Navy story to the Marty Kaiser story, and we’ll make a movie. And since I was both the technical guru and the victim, they made Gene Hackman, the technical guru, and Will Smith, the victim. And you basically put those two together, and then you get me. 

The film is a fictional thriller, but it raises very real concerns about unchecked government power and the abuse of surveillance technology; concerns that eventually led Marty to testify before Congress 

Marty Kaiser  – I was contacted by the House Select Committee on Intelligence who wanted to know about my sales of bugging equipment to various agencies. They sent two investigators to my shop, Tim Olifsen and Rick Vermeer, and they asked if they could see my sales of bugging equipment. So, I pulled open a file drawer, and there they all were.

Why was he producing and selling bugging equipment in the first place? Why did Congress want a look at his files? And how did the FBI get involved? It all started with a walk—and a wrong turn.

Let’s rewind to the early 1970s in the Broadway East neighborhood of Baltimore. Standing outside the old American Brewery building, now a national landmark is a young Marty Kaiser who just decided to take a walk. 

Marty Kaiser  – And when I left American Brewery, I made a left turn instead of a right turn, and I found in front of Fort Holabird, Maryland, the Center for Army Intelligence. So, I figured there’s got to have something broken in there, and drove around until I found the door that said supply, knocked on it, and met a Captain Domes And sure enough, they had tape recorders, variety detectors, all kinds of equipment that needed to be repaired. And I started at the top of the shelf and worked my way all the way down to the bottom and fixed everything they had. 

That’s what Marty does—he fixes things. He has a natural talent for tinkering with technology and solving problems.

Marty Kaiser – I guess the best point is to start with my job at RCA Laboratories in Princeton, and that led me eventually to Barbados, West Indies, where I developed what is known as the over-horizon radar. Normal radar can only see to the horizon, and this can see all the way around the world. They can see the back of your head, actually. And it’s still in use today, primarily in anti-drug operations.

I find all of this so fascinating! A savvy drug trafficker might try to fly under the radar or use other tricks to avoid detection, but Marty’s technology could literally bounce signals off the ionosphere to detect movement and objects across oceans, through jungles, and far beyond the horizon. As he put it, it could even see the back of your head.

As you can imagine, tech like that has a wide range of applications—and it makes Marty a pretty fascinating guy. Eventually, his passion for solving problems led him to Armco Steel, where he was brought in to repair a broken Enerscope.

Marty Kaiser – Which is a device that can actually look through a steel ingot and see if there are any cracks or air bubbles in it. I fixed it and he was very happy. It resulted in a bunch of other jobs that came out of that. 

And then of course there was the broken equipment in the storage locker of the Center for Army Intelligence

Marty Kaiser – But one thing I noticed is that for intelligence purposes, they were using commercially available equipment rather than equipment specifically designed for the job they were trying to do. So, I offered to make an audio amplifier for them, and they accepted so, from that point, I started manufacturing other products as I listened to the people in the intelligence community to see what they were trying to do and I followed that shortly with the first handheld bug detector. And I followed that with a telephone analyzer that measures all parameters on the telephone line to see if it’s been wiretapped or bugged surreptitiously. And that was what found the Watergate bugs. That was a big plus.

The audio amplifier he mentioned was model 1059 and it would eventually be used by the bomb disposal squad and it led to a robust business with many customers but then the Omnibus Crime Bill surfaced and things took a dramatic change. 

Marty Kaiser – In 1968, the Omnibus Crime Bill was passed around 1968, and that made it illegal to manufacture, assemble, possess any device or component thereof which was capable of illegal interception of oral communication. So, when the FBI started buying bugging equipment from me, I had a problem with that. I told the FBI that I really couldn’t accept orders from the FBI, and they said, well, we use a phony front called U.S. Recording Company. I thought, well, that sounds good, but they are not a government agency. So, I told the FBI, I will build the U.S. Recording Company and deliver the equipment to you, which is what I did.

Built into the Omnibus Crime Bill was an automatic five-year review. Eventually, the House Select Committee on Intelligence came knocking and asking about his sales, including those to the mysterious U.S. Recording Company.

Marty Kaiser – They said, what’s this? I said, that’s the FBI. They said, oh? So, the next thing I know, before the House Select Committee on Intelligence, telling the story that one time at the FBI headquarters, I had seen one of my invoices that had been marked up 150 percent. And I thought, well, that’s strange. I just said that’s their business, and let them do what they want to do. But that was a big no-no. That started a disaster that has lasted now pretty much until today, from 1975. Once I made my testimony before the House Select Committee on Intelligence, I lost all of my intelligence agency customers overnight. I was doing a half-million-dollar a year with the intelligence agency people. After that fateful day, I did zero from then to today. They just cut me off entirely. 

You’ve heard the expression, “You can’t fight City Hall” so being as resourceful as he was he pivoted again to bomb disposal, developing hundreds of life-saving products. 

Eventually, that too was shut down. All of it is documented in his book Help Yourself. A fascinating read. 

Marty Kaiser – It’s hard to look back and think about all this, but the amazing thing is I’ve never had a course in electronics in my life. And when I conceived these products, I just knew how to do it. I don’t know how I did it, but when an audio amplifier was needed, I designed it, developed it, manufactured it, and that was it. And it’s just a certain amount of joy that comes out of that. So, anyhow, it was fun. But despite the terror and the tragedies, it really was a lot of fun.

Looking back on the terror and the tragedy in your life can be a powerful motivation for writing a book—and Help Yourself! is Marty’s story, told by him, from his perspective and from the trenches of real experience.

If you enjoyed Enemy of the State or Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, you’ll definitely want to check out Help Yourself! A Story of FBI Corruption by Martin Kaiser. You can find it wherever you like to buy books, or visit his website at MartyKaiser.com.

That’s going to wrap it up for this edition of Newsgram. As always, Thanks for listening!