America at Night

The shocking true story of two former CIA operatives and their elaborate scheme involving multimillion dollar deals, Al Qaeda, and the US presidency-by the man who foiled their plan.

Robert Sensi speaks five languages fluently and blends into a crowd with unmatched ease. He has worked, or claimed to work, for the CIA, the Republican National Committee, and Kuwait Airlines. He has served time in prison for embezzlement and fraud. Sensi is wanted for questioning for a plot involving Al Qaeda, but the only information in the Department of Homeland Security's files is that he once worked for the CIA.

Richard Hirschfeld was recruited to work for the CIA by Bob Sensi, but puts Sensi to shame in the arts of subterfuge. In the seventies, Hirschfeld duped investors out of several million dollars by setting up a phony investment bank; his business partner died in mysterious circumstances, benefiting Hirschfeld to the tune of $5 million; and he allegedly stole a $12 million pay-off from Ferdinand Marcos intended for Ronald Reagan. He, like Sensi, had extensive connections to the Republican Party elite, and he too spent time in federal prison, for tax evasion and conspiracy.

It takes Larry Kolb, former spy, to figure out that Sensi and Hirschfeld have been working together smuggling billionaire Russian mafiosos into the United States. Homeland Security never even managed to take a photo of Hirschfeld, and they can't get the FBI and the CIA to verify each other's accounts. But even once arrests have been made, Kolb is certain that something more sinister is afoot. And when he begins to connect the dots, he realizes that he's on to the biggest possible con with the highest politicalstakes....

America at Night reads like a thriller, but the story is all too real. Kolb shows us exactly how one well-informed individual can do what all of our security agencies cannot: Follow the trail of two con men's dark crimes through a network of disguised identities and hidden transactions to reveal danger and corruption at the highest levels.

"After 20 years of CIA covert operations, Kolb looked forward to retirement and the obligatory memoir (Overworld, 2004), when he discovered the wildly sinister plot recounted in this engaging book. As a favor to the Department of Homeland Security, he consulted colleagues, his files and the Internet for information on Robert Sensi and Richard Hirschfeld, once vaguely CIA-connected but now wanted by the FBI for numerous financial scams. The avalanche of data he unearthed makes the inability of the FBI, CIA and DHS to gather information very disturbing. Specifically, Kolb discovered the pair had placed the treasurer of Sen. John Kerry's campaign committee on the board of a company that (perhaps inadvertently) sold supplies to al-Qaeda-a revelation that would have devastated Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign. Kolb also recounts details of his subjects' long career of fraud and extortion, often with cooperation from prominent Washington figures. Stories of powerful men behaving badly have irresistible appeal, and Kolb relates them in prose far more lively than the average bureaucrat's, while backing his story with footnotes, Internet addresses and quotes from named sources." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"The Republicans wouldn't really try to steal an election, would they? According to former CIA operative Kolb...you bet they would." Kirkus Reviews

"'How high up do you think this goes?' someone asks Mr. Kolb. It goes as high up as reading All the President's Men. But this book, for all its wild and entertaining cloak-and-dagger crime stories, can't otherwise compare with that one." Janet Maslin, New York Times

"In former CIA covert operator Larry Kolb's second nonfiction book, the suspense is palpable as he details the unraveling of a plot as sinister as any suspense novel." Rocky Mountain News

The True Story of Two Master Criminals Aiming to Take America's Biggest Prize and Our Security Agencies' Systematic Inability to Stop Them by the Former Intelligence Agent Recruited to Foil Their Plan

Robert Sensi has worked for the CIA, the Republican National Committee, and, as cover, for Kuwait Airways and the Kuwaiti royal family. He has twice served time in federal prison for embezzlement and fraud. Richard Hirschfeld, originally recruited to the CIA by Sensi, boasts an equally illustrious past: in the seventies he duped investors out of millions of dollars, later allegedly stole a $12-million payoff from Ferdinand Marcos intended for Ronald Reagan, and came within a hairbreadth of conning the U.S. Senate out of $50 million.

When the Department of Homeland Security suspects that Sensi and Hirschfeld are at the center of an investigation involving money laundering and the funding of Al Qaeda-and when their supposedly comprehensive database turns up little to no information on either man-it takes onetime spy Larry Kolb to crack the case, ultimately orchestrating Hirschfeld's spectacular capture. But when Kolb begins to connect the dots, he realizes something even more sinister is afoot, and that he's on to the biggest possible con with the highest political stakes.

Larry J. Kolb is the author of Overworld, a memoir. Having grown up around the world as the son of a senior United States intelligence official, Kolb entered the covert world after being recruited by CIA cofounder Miles Copeland, and was subsequently involved in intrigues in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Afghanistan, the Philippines, Nicaragua, Pakistan, and India. In 2004, with the publication of his first book, Overworld, Kolb intentionally broke his cover.