He also engaged in ethically questionable communications with Nixon and his staff, providing inside information about the Watergate investigation prior to the appointment of the Special Prosecutor.

But Reuss, a Harvard-trained lawyer and former prosecutor, told Rathlesberger by phone late that afternoon from Wisconsin: "I disagree with Ramsey" and that he saw nothing wrong and chose not to make a press statement.

Felt would later come to be described in Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's bestselling book All the President's Men as "Deep Throat," whose identity would remain a mystery until 2005.

On April 15, 1973, Attorney General Richard Kleindienst and Petersen informed Nixon that Dean was cooperating and that the Justice Department was building a criminal case against Haldeman and Ehrlichman.

[9] On April 17, 1973, Petersen told President Nixon that the Justice Department was investigating the break-in at Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist office by the White House Plumbers.

Several days later however, Petersen and Kleindienst persuaded Nixon that the Justice Department needed to disclose the matter to the court in Daniel Ellsberg's criminal case.

"[11] The conversations with Petersen would later be cited in the Articles of Impeachment against Richard Nixon, accusing the President of "disseminating information received from officers of the Department of Justice of the United States to subjects of investigations conducted by lawfully authorized investigative officers and employees of the United States, for the purpose of aiding and assisting such subjects in their attempts to avoid criminal liability.