In the News 2006

'You can be what you want to be' An exotic global background, an amazing American journey

Salem Evening News, Published June 25, 2008 By Alan Burke Staff writer MARBLEHEAD — Tanya DeGenova wants nothing more than to be thought of as an American. "In America, you can be what you want to be," says the German-born director of TSD Security Consulting Group in Boston. "I became a citizen when I was 18 years old. As soon as I could." And everything she's done here, everything she has achieved, everything she believes "feeds into one thing — that this is who I am — an American." So, it's not surprising that the former federal agent involved herself in electoral politics, recently opening her Marblehead home to a reception for Republican U.S. Senate candidate Jeff Beatty, who is running against Sen. John Kerry. Last year, DeGenova, undertook her own, ultimately unsuccessful, campaign for state representative. Support for Beatty is only natural. A former FBI agent, he worked with her late husband, Ben DeGenova, on the bureau hostage-rescue team. "I find Jeff to be of high integrity," she says. "He's also a retired (Army) Delta Force major and a man of his word." Though DeGenova considers herself a typical American, her background is anything but typical. One of the first female FBI agents, she worked undercover against drug dealers and Soviet spies, and even investigated the attempted assassination of President Reagan. The daughter of a French mother and a Russian father, she says she is probably descended from royalty. In a family displaced by revolution, she spent her early years in Casablanca. Tanya Ismestieff's mother died when Tanya was 10 months old. Her grandfather, a Mobil Oil executive, helped provide a home for the family in French North Africa. It all sounds very exotic, but DeGenova has little use for the past. "I was not aware of the Humphrey Bogart movie when I was growing up," she says. Even today, while her sisters are busily tracing the Ismestieff family's royal roots — they think the siblings might be baronesses — Tanya has little interest. "I was happy to find a home here," she says with a slight European accent, "and to be able to consolidate all my roots into one." She started attending a Roman Catholic church because it seemed more American than Russian Orthodox. Her family came to the United States in 1965, settling in Syracuse, N.Y., where she attended that city's famous university. Later, she earned a master's in foreign relations from Georgetown. Linguistical ability brought DeGenova to the FBI in the 1970s. A Russian translator (she also speaks French, German, Haitian Creole and some Arabic), she was charged with listening in on wiretaps of suspected KGB agents, debriefing and "baby-sitting" defectors. The assignment came easily to a woman whose father was a committed anti-communist.

"Counterintelligence — it's a gentleman's game," DeGenova said. "Nobody killed me." However, there were few gentlemen among the gangsters she spied on. She retains photos of her targets, in handcuffs, marched off to jail. In March 1981, DeGenova responded to the shooting of President Reagan. By chance, she was passing the hospital as the stricken president was admitted. She and a fellow agent took custody of his bloodied shirt and jacket. "My job was to interview any potential witnesses. I didn't get home for 48 hours," she said. She grilled people like ABC News reporter Sam Donaldson and a barber who watched shooter John Hinckley Jr. tarry in his shop. "Do you want a haircut?" he asked. Hinckley gave no answer, but moved across the street where Reagan was due to appear. "Thank God Hinckley was a bad shot," DeGenova said. The bullet that lodged between the president's heart and lung ricocheted off the president's limousine. An explosive round, it failed to explode. Hinckley was found insane and institutionalized. When Reagan recovered, DeGenova was regularly invited to the White House Christmas party. The president greeted her. "He had a very powerful, deep look," she said. She compares it to a meeting years later with Reagan's Soviet counterpart, Mikhail Gorbachev. That happened when Gorbachev visited Swampscott in 2000. "I didn't feel the same power," DeGenova says. "Oh, my God," Gorbachev told her, "you speak Russian so well." "My great-grandfather was a general in the czar's army," she replied. Reagan inspired her journey toward the Republican Party. In Virginia, she worked for Sen. John Warner and Marshall Coleman, who narrowly lost a governor's race to Democrat Douglas Wilder. As an agent, she arrested American-turned-Israeli-spy Jonathan Pollard in 1985. Toward the end of her FBI career, DeGenova was assigned to the Boston office. She saw little of the turmoil created by agents using mobster James "Whitey" Bulger as an informant. "But it was a very hard culture," she said. "I would come home crying sometimes. It was a very stressful situation." The move also began a new love affair — with Marblehead. DeGenova married twice, both times to FBI agents. The first marriage ended in divorce. She speaks wistfully of second husband Ben DeGenova. "Even the FBI didn't have enough action for him," she said. She has a daughter from each marriage, the youngest of whom graduated from Marblehead High School. Here, DeGenova's Russian roots finally re-emerged. She named them Alexandra and Anastasia.

 

Salem Evening News Published: February 21, 2008 08:42 am Women share stories of courage, power By Michelle Morrissey Staff writer One woman fought to have laws changed after seeing her rapist finally brought to justice more than 30 years after the brutal crime. Another broke through the glass ceiling of the FBI to became one of the lead investigators of the 1981 assassination attempt on President Reagan. A third, finding that abused women and children had nowhere to go to escape their abusers, created one. Three ordinary women who, through the course of events, found themselves in extraordinary situations, will tell their stories in the "Women, Crime and Justice" event at The Landing restaurant in Marblehead on Thursday, Feb. 28. Organizer CJ Cavalieri of Marblehead runs a local marketing business. She met Kathleen Ham, one of the speakers, over the summer, and decided to create a full evening out of a storytelling idea. "These women have all had different life experiences, but they are all dynamic women, and I've asked them to share that," Cavalieri said. Tanya DeGenova of Marblehead, a former FBI agent and now a security consultant, said events like this provide an important service to a local community - especially its young women. "We need to mentor women who are coming up," she said. "In my generation, most women would become teachers, secretaries, etc. But things have changed. We need to encourage our women to reach beyond the normal, reach beyond what's expected." And each of the three women has done just that. Kathleen Ham Kathleen Ham listens during a news conference in New York, Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2005. Fletcher Anderson Worrell, 58, was convicted Wednesday of raping Ham at knifepoint 32 years ago, a verdict made possible by DNA technology that did not exist when he was a suspect decades ago. /Associated Press         Ham will tell you that she was brutalized twice. Once by the man who sneaked into her New York City apartment and raped her on June 26, 1973; again by his defense lawyer at trial, whose cross-examination she describes as vicious. "I was really put on what I call 'the slut seat.' I was called everything in the book," she said of the defense attorney's grueling cross examination. He called her a prostitute and tried to cast doubt on whether she was really raped. It was a classic case of "blaming the victim," she said. "It was devastating to me. The humiliation and being raped was bad enough, but in court, everyone was watching and people were snickering." Ultimately, the trial ended in a hung jury. Ham was so traumatized by the courtroom experience, that she was unable to go through a second trial. Her rapist, Clarence Williams, jumped bail, and Ham moved to California, trying to put it all behind her. Then came a phone call 30 years later. "It was a friend of mine from New York. She said 'The district attorney's office is trying to reach you.'" They had found her attacker. Williams, who had changed his name to Fletcher Worrell, was picked up in Georgia and in the three decades since Ham's attack had been charged with attacking other women. Ham felt she was to blame. If she had testified at the second trial, she thought, maybe her attacker would not have been free during those years. So in 2005, she came back to testify, telling again how Worrell had raped her at knifepoint. Modern DNA testing enabled prosecutors to tie Worrell definitively to the 1973 crime, and he was convicted. Since her legal victory, Ham has campaigned to change the statute of limitations on rape laws in several states. She joined the fight to change New York's law, and was successful. She speaks frankly about the rape and the ensuing legal battle, but refers to the events quite separately. "The rape ... I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I fought as hard as I could, but I learned quickly that men ... especially when they have a knife to your throat, are stronger," she said. "But the trial was a complete humiliation ... I had to sit there and take it." Now she feels it's her duty to speak out and work to change laws. "Thirty-two years later, I am still angry about what happened to me in court," she said. She's heard from so many women over the years about her story, and now that she's getting into the "Internet thing" she's received so many e-mails, and keeps in touch with quite a few of them. "They tell me that it's as if I put into words what they had wanted to say." On Thursday, she'll speak about many laws that "would not have been changed for the better but for the fact that women started speaking out. "And women have to continue to do these things," she said. Tanya DeGenova Tanya DeGenova DeGenova once had two factors working against her. First, she was a woman trying to break into a male-dominated field. Second, she was too short. But that didn't keep her from rising through the ranks at the Federal Bureau of Investigation. "I was recruited in 1974 into the FBI, and when I reported to Washington, I was told I was too short to be an agent," DeGenova said She can chuckle about that now-outdated idea, but then, DeGenova said, it was a different world. The progress she made while with the FBI, as well as her experience mentoring young professional women, are the reasons she wanted to take part in Thursday's event. "We have to encourage women to step forward and share their stories," DeGenova said. "I'm sure in our community we have many women who have very interesting stories to share." DeGenova will tell one of her most interesting stories: the day she was a first-responder to the attempted assassination of Reagan in 1981 by gunman John Hinckley. After regulations were changed that did away with things like a height requirement to become an agent, DeGenova quickly worked her way from FBI linguist (fluent in Russian, French and German) undercover agent, to becoming a special agent. It was as a field agent in '81 that she got the call about the Reagan shooting. "I just happened to be in the right place in the right time, when I got the call," she said. She didn't sleep for the next 48 hours; she and other agents had to retrace where Hinckley was that day and the day before, finding witnesses and evidence along the way. "It was an ordinary day in my extraordinary career," she said. She's quick to point out, however, "Anybody could have that day in any career." DeGenova, who runs a security consulting business, said her background as a first-generation immigrant was at the heart of her ambition. "I don't want to settle for less, I don't' want to be a second-rate citizen," she said. She recently ran for public office, and while she wasn't elected, she says that striving for high goals is something all women should do. "Sharing my particular story may encourage someone else to step forward," she said. Celeste Niarchos In 1978, Niarchos had been practicing law for three years. She was starting her family. And she wanted to give something back. When some of her family members were victims of domestic violence, Niarchos said, there were little or no services to help them. So with a few other people and a $167,000 federal grant, she funded HAWC, Help for Abused Women and Their Children, as a support agency for anyone affected by domestic violence. "This was a cause that was near and dear to my heart," she said. "I was frustrated with the lack of response by law enforcement and society, to address the problem." Now a lawyer focusing on family law in Salem, Niarchos says she still sees the effects of abuse - both physical and emotional - on families. "Society was just beginning to pay attention to domestic violence (when she started her project). Very few shelters were available," she said. "The law as it then existed, provided no protection for women," she added. "Unless a police officer or a witness was present, the perpetrator would not be charged with a crime." That, despite overwhelming physical evidence, she said. Things changed for the better when the 209A legislation - the restraining order law - went into effect. "It was passed in the late '70s and that was a huge development," she said. HAWC was part of the movement. "We were very much involved in promoting the passage of that legislation and designing a program that includes support services," she said. The holistic approach to crisis intervention includes support groups, a hot line, a safe shelter, education and substance abuse counseling if needed. "We wanted to help women and their children break that cycle of violence," she said. One of most successful parts of the HAWC program is its support groups, where abused women meet other women who have been abused. "We show women, 'See, there's nothing wrong with you. You're going to meet women going through the same exact thing.' " She said she'll speak Thursday about the effects of abuse on children. "People still don't' have a clear understanding, that it has very negative effects. We want to help parents understand that their actions affect their children," she said. "Historically we see that children who've grown up in a situation with battering, (they) themselves become batterers," she said. Staff writer Michelle Morrissey can be reached at 978-946-2496, or via e-mail, mmorrissey@salemnews.com. If you go What: "Women, Crime and Justice" dinner and talk When: Thursday, Feb. 28; registration and dinner, 6 to 7 p.m., formal presentations, 7:15 to 8:30 p.m. Where: The Landing Restaurant, 81 Front St., Marblehead How: $25 buffet dinner. Cash bar available. A portion of the proceeds benefits the NOW Foundation. For information, call CJ Cavalieri, 781-631-4546 or e-mail mprsolutions@comcast.net.

Marblehead Reporter Wed Feb 20, 2008, 01:05 PM EST Women's speaking series to benefit local charities By Carolyn Moore MARBLEHEAD - "Women, Crime and Justice: will be the topic of discussion over dinner next Thursday night at The Landing Restaurant, as a local resident helps kick off a three-part series aimed at encouraging women to share their life experiences with other women and the community as a whole. The event is scheduled to run from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 28. The night will begin with a buffet dinner and follow with a formal presentation by a panel of three professional women. Tickets are $25, and a portion of the proceeds will benefit the National Organization for Women Foundation. (www.nowfoundation.org) "There are so many dynamic women who are willing to share their experiences," said C.J. Cavalieri, owner of Marketing and PR Solutions in Marblehead. Cavalieri founded the Women's Speaking Series this past summer after she met the woman who would inspire the series, Kathleen Ham. Ham is a North Shore native turned California lawyer who, in 2005, agreed to return to New York to testify against the stranger who had raped her nearly 30 years earlier. Her courage, testimony and DNA testing led to his conviction and information linking him to 23 other rapes. Linda Fairstein will feature her story in a new book, "Killer Heat,", due out next month. "I was so compelled by her life experience and asked her if she would consider sharing her story with other women. She readily agreed," said Cavalieri. With the help of local sponsors that include North Shore Kitchens Plus, National Grand Bank and Marblehead Savings Bank, Cavalieri secured not only Ham, but also Tanya DeGenova, a retired FBI supervisory special agent and founder of TSD Security Consulting Group in Boston, as well as Celeste Niarchos, one of the founders of HAWC, Help for Abused Women and Children, who today has her own family-law practice in Salem. "The topic - women, crime and justice - was intriguing to me," said Niarchos, who will discuss the ways in which the founding of HAWC corresponded with the creation of the Abuse Prevention Act (Chapter 209A) and the dramatic shift in how abuse was addressed thereafter. While Niarchos' story is intriguing in its own right, she is excited to hear the stories of her fellow panelists. "I have some interesting stories to share," said DeGenova, who recently made a bid for the Republican nomination to fill the vacated 8th Essex District state-representative seat. DeGenova is a strong believer that women's options are limitless. "We need to encourage women to reach beyond traditional careers - to not be afraid to reach beyond the norm," said DeGenova. The women's speaker series will include two future installments, scheduled for June and October. Each event will benefit a different charity on the North Shore, said Cavalieri. While space is limited at this Thursday's event, tickets are still available. Contact Cavalieri at 781-631-4546 or e-mail mprsolutions@comcast.net to make reservations.