he's called over by ehrlichman. ehrlichman tells him this stuff should never see the light of day. it should be capped whatever secure file you have. the white house can say we have turned everything over to the fbi. much later, we learn pat gray on his own initiative, and this -- i was there. he destroys that data. 2 envelopes full of it. he burns it with christmas wrappings in connecticut. this is clearly an obstruction of justice. he didn't get nailed for it. he claims he been told, to the best of our knowledge, not of it related to the break-in. that was true. [indiscernible] there was a stack of cables, who sent them back to the state department, there was one that showed hunt was playing cia forger and making the kennedy administration, if not the president responsible for the killing of dm when he was president of south, that assassination. there were memos relating to that where they try to peddle it to various people in the media. there is a lot of troublesome stuff. unrelated to watergate. i have never been sure if that was an obstruction, to do that. i had very clear ins

he's called over by ehrlichman. ehrlichman tells him this stuff should never see the light of day. and it just should be cap in -- cap -- cap -- kept in whatever secure file you have. the white house can say we have turned everything over to the fbi. much later, we learn pat gray on his own initiative, and this -- i was there. he destroys that data. 2 envelopes full of it. the puts it in a burn bag -- he puts it in a burn bag, he burns it with christmas wrappings in connecticut. this is clearly an obstruction of justice. but he didn't get nailed for it. the again -- he again claims he been told, to the best of our knowledge, not of it related to the break-in. that was true. [indiscernible] there was a stack of cables, who sent them back to the state department. but there was one that showed hunt was playing cia forger and making the kennedy administration, if not the president himself responsible for the killing of diem when he was president of south, that assassination. it is clear there was something there were memos relating to that where they try to peddle it to various people

mitchell, haldeman, ehrlichman, et al was a little more piercing and in depth than the senate testimony. as i say, i was just trying to generally draw the picture because i knew at that point -- i thought at that point it was going to be my word against haldeman, ehrlichman, mitchell colson, the president, and, you know, i had no motive to lie about any of these things, which would make it hard for them to accuse me of perjury because i was trained to help the government unravel all of this. moderator: did you anticipate we would one day have tapes to use to judge your testimony? john: yes, i did, i believed i had been taped on some of the conversations because i could not remember them cold. i could just remember generally what had happened in each one. i could characterize them. i under testified a lot of them. while i remember to more than i testified to, i thought some days are taped, some are not. nixon actually had -- when i mentioned that, i mentioned this to the prosecutors, too. at one point peterson asked to send in one of the tapes, you know dean said he thinks he is has been

the president, john ehrlichman bob haldeman are all in san clemente. i called john and i said i have something we should talk about eye to eye, person to person. i jumped on the next courier flight and flew to california. i met with him the next morning and he said, what's troubling you? i told him what caulfield had done in by then i had pulled dc code and learned it's a capital offense the district of columbia anybody dies as a result of arson. i said i cannot believe the white house would risk having involved in a capital offense or would get involved in this kind of insanity. i just went on and ticked up all the reasons this was absurd. colson was still back in washington and ehrlichman picked up the phone. you would get the white house operator immediately when you picked up the phone. he told her to get chuck colson on the line. he came right on. ehrlichman said to colson, young council the news out here and he does not think the brookings plan is a good one, turn it off. he put down the phone. ehrlichman turned to me and said anything else i can

ehrlichman's advice was good. i thought if they prosecute which is 97% likely, i'm bound to be convicted -- 7000 pages of top-secret documents. as might lawyer said to me, it has a bad ring to it. moreover, 7000 pages, i could go away for life not just a year or two or five years. i expected to go to jail. >> for life? >> for life for 30 years. not necessarily consecutive life terms. i was put on trial facing 12 felony counts, 11 were worth 10 years each in the conspiracy count was five years so 115 year possible sentence. with good behavior, i would only serve 1/3 of that which is 35 years. i would be getting out this year. that's 35 years after 1973 which is when the trial ended. >> did the f ei -- the administration feared the fbi was not working hard enough to prosecute you? >> yes, my wife can tell you about this. the story was all over that he feared the fbi would not go after it liddy thought they wouldn't go after it because lewis was such a close buddy of j edgar hoover. they never met. did you know that?

he was willing to go to prison for the president but not for haldeman and ehrlichman. also, he was not willing to perjure himself. he was a fairly unprincipled person and i think has learned a lot of truthfulness now. i like him a lot. he is a friend of mine. i believe he is a great truth teller. at that time, he was still a white house man, as he put it, blind ambition. he was not willing to perjure himself. he revealed in the course of plea bargaining the break into the doctor's office. i will condense that greatly. nixon did his best which is pretty good to keep that from going to my trial for 13 days or so, from the 13th-26th. nixon kept the knowledge of the fielding break-in which was clearly his responsibility to inform the judge of this break-in and the nsa wiretaps. he ordered the material not go to trial. the lawyers on april 25 went into him and implied they would have to resign because they would be guilty of obstruction of justice if they did not pass that material on. nixon on the 25th, then authorizes them to give the information to my judge, to tell the

. >> abc's john ehrlichman has the latest. john good morning to you. >> reporter: t.j. and reena, it's been an incredible 4 hours. he is recovering after that dangerous crash landing. harrison ford was strapped to a gurney breathing, unconscious. first responders wheeled him from the wreckage. moments before the crash this was his mayday message. >> engine failure. immediate return. >> reporter: authorities say the 72-year-old lost nrg power wane and was attempting a return but the plane couldn't make it. >> he clipped the top of a tree and came to rest on the golf court. >> reporter: an eyewitness described the scene. >> he was able to speak. he expressed that he was in pain which was no surprise. he had a significant head wound. >> reporter: the plane ford was piloting was built in the 1940s. he once told barbara walters about his love of flying. >> i love the places you go i love the people in aviation. the people i meet in aviation. i love seeing the world from an airplane. i'm in love with flying. >> reporter: and as the recovery for ford is under way he is here hi

. >> john dean joined the nixon white house as counsel to the president after john ehrlichman

nixon said you know it was just a few bad apples halderman and ehrlichman and colson the guys closest to him. how close do you have to be to the governor for people to say he's connected. >> keep in mind we've heard christie on this. he's had his press conferences, he had his report that he put out. christie has called bridget kelly every name in the book he's called david wildstein ever name in the book. we've not heard from kelly or wildstein. if these indictments come out, you know how they're usually written by federal prosecutors, we'll presumably hear from them through this indictment and there's the possibility that we'll hear from them publicly. if you have others like them who are out there saying you have christie up there saying this was all me there's more to this story than that. that's a whole new layer we haven't dealt with yet. >> what are you able to report on this tonight? >> we're learning more about david wildstein. he's the guy at the port authority who got the famous e-mail, time for traffic problems in ft. lee, and he responded, got it. he's widely believed to b

> john dean joined the nixon white house in july of 1970 as counsel to the president after john ehrlichmanleft the position to become chief advisor. coming up next, part one of the two-part interview with mr. dean. he talks about some of his early white house assignments, watergate, and the individuals behind the 1972 break-in at the democratic national committee headquarters. richard nixon presidential library conducted this interview as part of a project to document the 37th president's administration. this portion is about one hour. >> in the early days, what kind of access to the president did you have? >> i knew enough about how the white house worked from my dealings with the staff at the justice department. if the president calls you and you did not call the president when he wanted you to do something, typically, he was a president who liked particularly to work with paper. my memorable first assignment that i did not know was from the president initially was a memo that was waiting for me when i arrived from the staff secretary, john brown. it said cryptically -- it was an action

>> john dean joint the nixon white house in july of 1970 as counsel to the president after john ehrlichman left the position to become chief thomistic advisor. coming up next part one of the two-part interview with mr. dean. he talks about some of his early white house assignments watergate, and the individuals behind the 1972 break-in at the democratic national committee headquarters. richard nixon presi

> john dean joined the nixon white house in july of 1970 as counsel to the president after john ehrlichmanposition to become chief advisor. coming up next, part one of the two-part interview with mr. dean. he talks about some of his early white house assignments, watergate, and the individuals behind the 1972 break-in at the