Steve Jobs US Files Provide New Details on Drug Use, Kidnap Worry
Recently released Pentagon documents indicate that in the 1980's Steve Jobs expressed concern that his daughter might be kidnapped in an effort to blackmail him. The documents also provide more information about the Apple co-founder's drug use as a teenager as well as a previously unreported arrest in 1975 for having failed to pay a speeding ticket.
The new details are included in 1988 documents processed by the Defense Investigative Service that were obtained by the online magazine Wired through a Freedom of Information of Act request. At the time Jobs had applied for a Top Security clearance when he headed up the computer firm Pixar.
The newly released Pentagon documents provide additional information to details first made public in February, when in another FOIA request, the FBI released a 1991 background check conducted when Jobs was appointed to the President's Export Council. Those documents briefly mentioned that Jobs had a Top Secret security clearance when he headed Pixar.
According to Wired, the DOD documents don't explain why Jobs had applied for a Top Security clearance in 1988. However, it notes that Walter Isaacson's biography of Jobs said Pixar required a security clearance because of company contracts with intelligence agencies to render information gathered by reconnaissance flights and satellites
As part of a standard line of questioning, investigators reviewing his application asked Jobs how he might be blackmailed. He replied that he had a daughter out of wedlock whom he felt might be the target of a kidnapping.
"The type of blackmail or threat that could be made against me would be if someone kidnapped [her]," he said. Though he believed any kidnapping attempt would be motivated "for the purpose of money, not because I may have access to classified Top Secret material or documents."
Jobs said that if he did receive his clearance, "there can be a possibility of blackmail and I do acknowledge this fact."
In his application, Jobs providing precise details about his previously reported use of LSD, marijuana and hashish during his youth
Jobs wrote, "I used LSD from approximately 1972 to 1974. Throughout that period of time I used the LSD approximately ten to fifteen times. I would ingest the LSD on a sugar cube or in a hard form of gelatin. I would usually take the LSD when I was by myself. I have no words to explain the effect the LSD had on me, although, I can say it was a positive life changing experience for me and I am glad I went through that experience." In a handwritten portion next to the statement, that was initialed by Jobs, he wrote, "This was the reason I used LSD." At the time Jobs would have been 17 to 19 years of age.
He admitted to having smoked marijuana and also to having eaten it in cooked brownies from 1972 to 1976 about once or twice weekly. He admitted to having used hashish five times during that time frame. He told investigators that using marijuana and hashish made him "relaxed and creative." In another document he responded "none" to the question of intentions for future use.
The documents note that investigators asked Jobs about why he had failed to point out in his questionnaire that in 1975 he had been arrested in Eugene, Ore., for not having paid a $50 speeding ticket.
He explained that "while being questioned behind a store in Eugene, Oregon for being a minor with possible possession of alcohol, I was arrested for an outstanding warrant for not paying a prior speeding ticket." At the time, Jobs would have been 20 years of age
Jobs wrote that because he did not have any alcohol he was "therefore not arrested for that reason. " He added, "I satisfied the warrant by paying off the fine of approximately $50.00. He said the police review of records found an outstanding arrest warrant for the unpaid speeding ticket. He was arrested on the spot, Jobs said he paid the speeding fine "and that was the end of the matter."
Jobs wrote in a statement that he had not mentioned the incident because he didn't think it was an "actual arrest" but "was only for not paying my speeding ticket which I eventually paid." He said he "had no intentions of falsifying" his questionnaire by not mentioning the incident and did not think about it while answering it.
Jobs died last year after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.