FOIA Request on UFO Hypnotist Leads to FBI Surveillance Records

FBI records responsive to the late psychologist, UFO investigator, and advocate for the use of hypnosis as a memory enhancer, Leo Sprinkle, were obtained by Expanding Frontiers Research. The 79 of 91 responsive pages obtained have just one reference to Sprinkle but, instead, serve as further verification of an ongoing and massive mid-20th century surveillance operation conducted on American academics who opposed the Vietnam War.

A 1971 Vietnam War protest in Washington, DC

The Bureau launched investigations and disseminated results to dozens of its field offices on educators and scholars questioning U.S. policy in Vietnam, as well as organizers of protests and the universities where they worked. Intelligence was collected, including the use of numerous confidential informants, then distributed to a network of participating FBI offices to keep them advised and in the loop.

This writer invites consideration of the material in the context of COINTELPRO, a 1956-1971 FBI set of counterintelligence programs conducted with the expressed goal to expose, discredit or otherwise neutralize individuals or groups targeted for their supposed subversive potential. After COINTELPRO itself was exposed, the programs were identified as illegal and in violation of civil rights.

The first page of the records obtained, shown below, is the opening of a May 1965 FBI memo concerning an Inter-University Committee for a Public Hearing on Viet Nam. The abbreviation “IS,” following the subject line, likely refers to Internal Security.

For those who share this writer's interest in examining specifically what we're looking at here, the memo was sent to Dir. Hoover from a Detroit Special Agent in Charge (SAC). Dissemination to dozens of FBI offices was reported and copies were enclosed for FBI headquarters. The letters and numbers in the right-hand margin were added later by FOIA personnel when processing the document for public release. The markings represent FOIA exemption codes, cited as justification for the corresponding redacted sections of the page.

The Hook-up

Forthcoming pages of the memo reference a national “hook-up” demonstration, scheduled for May 15, 1965, to be conducted in coordination with a series of “teach-in” events at university campuses. The circumstances arose from what was at first going to be a group telephone call out of Washington, DC, involving participating protesters and interested parties, but turned into a “hook-up” to be listen-only or transmitted by radio. That's because the number of people requesting to participate increased to a point of surpassing available technology and practical costs (Long distance phone calls were expensive in the 1960s).

Faculty from colleges all over the country wanted to be part of the activities, which had grown into becoming days of scheduled speakers and awareness-raising events: a national “teach-in.” While many academics and departments expressed interest and committed resources, the University of Michigan was identified as a catalyst by the FBI, thus the Detroit office served as a lead in collecting, organizing and disseminating intelligence.

University of Michigan

The hundreds of articles archived at Newspapers dot com related to Vietnam War protests and ongoing teach-ins include an Edwin A. Lahey column from the Wednesday, March 16, 1966, edition of the Detroit Free Press, pictured below. Several social dynamics of the era may easily be surmised from the tone.

University of Michigan was the home to the Center for Research on Conflict Resolution (CRCR). It operated from 1952-1972, tumultuous times for the nation both foreign and domestic. It is clear from information cited in the 1965 Bureau communications that FBI investigations of the CRCR and associates went back years, long before the May 1965 protests were conceived.

The same is the case for several academics subsequently discussed in the material, as investigations from as early as the 1950s were cited in summaries. The material disseminated also included an inventory of confidential informants – heavily redacted when processed for FOIA release, as pictured right – who were cited as sources throughout the material obtained.

Multiple references were made to names of protesters obtained from petitions, which obviously served as intelligence sources. Ironically, a primary purpose of select petitions may be to assist intelligence and law enforcement agencies in compiling lists of surveillance targets, based on the apparent sympathies and belief systems of those who sign.

The Detroit FBI reported on an informant who advised of an enclosure distributed in the mailings of the Inter-University Committee for a Public Hearing on Viet Nam. The mailer represented a means of building support for the teach-in. The first two paragraphs of the mailer were documented by the Bureau:

The informant likewise supplied names of people who responded to the enclosure - some 30 pages of them that were disseminated throughout the FBI. Along with names, the long list included location, university affiliation, and nature of support pledged for the teach-in. The list was categorized alphabetically by city, presumably for the convenience of regional field offices, and consisted of people spread from New York to Los Angeles.

FBI Concerns

FBI concerns centered on the Communist Party and subversive activities ostensibly conducted under the guise of peace movements and support of freedom of speech. This led to suspicion aimed at groups with such overtly harmless names as the Chicago Committee to Defend the Bill of Rights.

FBI caution was not completely unreasonable, even if its tactics were arguably authoritarian and evolved into overkill. One specific circumstance is cited in the material in which a protest organizer morally supported an individual the Bureau conclusively knew to be traveling on multiple fraudulent passports. Other similar circumstances were cited, some involving raising funds for the legal defense of people engaged in such questionable activities.

In one instance, a former faculty member at the University of Michigan was cited who had been held in contempt of the House Committee on Un-American Activities (Those opposing or calling for the Committee to be abolished were automatically suspect, much less if held in contempt). The motives of peace movements and protests that questioned the judgment of the White House were therefore considered potentially deceptive, even if one could surmise a vast majority of protesters were not willfully acting as foreign subversive agents. Many protesters were legitimately interested in expressing objections about American foreign policy, but those people - and, perhaps more aptly stated, their rights - were not subjects of concern for J. Edgar Hoover's FBI.

Questionable protest agendas or not, the Bureau observably documented a significant amount of speculation about the loyalties of a surveillance target. The FBI solicited subjective opinions from informants and witnesses when developing assessments, then widely distributed those assessments.

The article below is from the May 15, 1965, edition of the Winston-Salem (NC) Journal. Like the article offered above, it represents a number of self-evident social dynamics of the era. This article was specifically selected for consideration because the Winston-Salem Journal, along with other media outlets, were owned by Gordon Gray, a well-connected and influential career member of the intelligence community, as previously explored by EFR.

Leo Sprinkle

So, what about the reference to Leo Sprinkle? Where did the UFO hypnotist who "helped" some 200 reported subjects learn more about their alleged encounters and factored significantly in the Bennewitz Affair fit into all this? It may not surprise you to hear that's not entirely clear.

The last page of the final pdf of records obtained has the lone reference to Leo Sprinkle, pictured below. It is an FBI letterhead memo dated May 20, 1965, once again addressing the Inter-University Committee for a Public Hearing on Viet Nam. It documents the Denver office contained no information identifiable with Sprinkle and seemingly other individuals, names of which were redacted, as was the title of a memo or inquiry to which a significantly redacted response was issued. More information and context are not currently known.

EFR originally submitted a FOIA request to the FBI for records responsive to the late Leo Sprinkle in July 2022. The Bureau advised in June 2024 of the existence of 91 pages responsive to the request. EFR reduced the request to the first 48 pages in order to position it in a small track and minimize processing time. FBI provided those pages in November with select redactions.

The final 43 pages were then requested. In its final response letter of Dec. 20, 2024, FBI stated 31 of the 43 pages were provided and 12 were withheld in full. 

EFR appealed the fully withheld 12 pages. The Department of Justice, Office of Information Policy, which serves as the appeal authority for the FBI, denied the appeal and upheld the initial ruling of the Bureau. The use of FOIA exemptions and foreseeable harm of disclosure, from the appeal response dated May 16, 2025 (60 years and a day since the national "hook-up" protest of May 15, 1965), as explained by the Office of Information Policy in its own words: