CIA MEXICO CITY Base TRANSLATOR B. TARASOFF

BORIS DMITRI TARASOFF
 He was born within imperial Russia amid nineteen hundred and eight, immigrated to the US, and became a naturalized citizen. As the nineteen twenties passed Boris went to a university in New York and during nineteen forty-one he enlisted with the United States Army. He was later assigned to the Counterintelligence Corps (CIC) while serving in Germany and married his wife Anna by the end of that decade. Tarasoff became a CIA intelligence assistant serving the Foreign Documents Division in the course of nineteen fifty-five and was promoted a year later. By nineteen sixty-three he was transferred to Mexico City Station in the role of operations officer.

Boris aided in transcribing and translating some Agency surveillance traffic from Communist aligned embassies and other specified targets. Among those he provided surveillance materials to was Mexico City Station’s photographic expert Robert Zambernardi. Tarasoff stated the project he supported was overseen by technical services officer Charles Flick during nineteen sixty-three. Officials used his transcription to support allegations Lee Harvey Oswald visited the Soviet and Cuban Embassy compounds on multiple occasions following the assassination of President Kennedy. However, the tapes and some original materials Boris produced were destroyed before most investigators could review them.

He continued his employment with the Agency stationed at Mexico City until his retirement amid nineteen seventy. Later that decade Boris and Anna Tarasoff were questioned on prior operational matters by the House Select Committee on Assassinations. They were unable to explain why officials had not memorialized their work and made some interpretations not supported by other witness memories. Yet intelligence officials destroyed much of the original materials and left no clear evidence to support or dispel related allegations.