Beverly Hills Spy: The Double-Agent Flying Ace Who Infiltrated Hollywood and Helped Japan Attack Pearl Harbor (2024) by Ron Drabkin draws from declassified UK, FBI and US Naval Intelligence and provides an informative history.

According to Jeffrey Trussler, vice admiral (retired) US Navy and former director of Naval Intelligence, "[It's] an incredible story of British WWI hero ‘Rutland of Jutland’ and his fascinating life spying for Japan before WWII. Frederick Rutland traveled the world and mingled with Hollywood celebrities, all while the FBI, MI5, and the Office of Naval Intelligence watched him closely. A reminder of a lesson learned long before 9/11 that when law enforcement agencies, intelligence agencies, and allies do not work together, the consequences can be deadly."

Below is an excerpt from Beverly Hills Spy (2024) by Ron Drabkin:

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Ken Ringle, Office of Naval Intelligence, knew he needed to make the call to the local FBI office. As he expected, the call was indeed rocky. He explained to FBI Special Agent in Charge Richard Hood that a stash of US documents with national security implications was almost certainly being driven from Seattle to the Olympic Hotel in Los Angeles’s Little Tokyo. From there, Tachibana would drive the documents over the border, pass the documents over at the Molino Rojo, and a quick bribe would ensure the documents would end up on a ship to Tokyo. Even a cursory glance would show just how sensitive this information was, and Ringle could bring over some of what they’d found.

Hood understood the threat to US national security, but his first reaction was annoyance. He replied, “Let me get this perfectly straight, Ringle. You kept us in the dark about this suspect in Seattle. Your colleague Zacharias, for all we knew, was consorting with this suspect as well. To get evidence, you committed multiple illegal acts, breaking and entering being just the first.”

Ringle replied, “Yes, we bent the law a bit. However, did you see the information the suspect had? He even had stolen the plans for the new Boeing bomber. In the event of war, if that information gets to Japan, I’m sure it will mean the deaths of thousands of our boys. I’m sorry to put you in an uncomfortable situation, but this needs to be prevented.”

Hood continued to unload on Ringle. He had gotten a report from his agent in Glendale already. “If there is a war with Japan, you say? If? Are you trying to make it happen? My men tell me the suspect is bruised because he was ‘resisting arrest’? Do you want me to believe that?” Ringle, unfazed, told Hood that the Glendale Police had reported the suspect was disobedient and aggressive.

Hood continued, “Do you realize how bad this could look in the newspapers? Do you have any idea what the State Department would say if word got out that we’re beating up Japanese government officials? There would be a major international incident. Hell, at some point, there might even be a war with the Japs. But I won’t allow that war to start here, on my watch, because you don’t like to follow proper procedures. The FBI does things by the book. If we are told to take out a suspect, we do. But we don’t make the call.”

Ringle’s mind wandered to a recent report about an Australian agent, Harry Freame, who had ended up dead after being attacked on a Tokyo street just a couple months earlier. Prior to that, the Briton— Cox— had died “in a fall from a window.” Japan and the FBI weren’t playing by the same rules, and Okada and his documents were a clear and present danger to the United States. He needed to be dealt with immediately.

Hood also realized the documents needed to be secured, and soon, but that it needed to be done in the proper way. He needed to confer with Tamm at FBI HQ. Hood had kept the boss in the loop on Tachibana, going back to the consulate raid in March, but all the evidence seized at that time was from two illegal break-ins. Fortunately, they did now have some evidence that just might hold up in a court of law: the documentation from the Al Blake incident.

Tamm felt the evidence provided by Blake was a bit weak. But, it was all they got. It would have to do.

Before Okada even arrived at the Olympic hotel in Los Angeles, Special Agent A. D. Horn had filed an affidavit and been issued a search warrant for violations of the Espionage Act, specifically mentioning the papers delivered by Blake to Kono, and of course not mentioning ONI or any of the illegal searches."

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See an hour-long discussion about Drabkin's research and his book on WW2TV:

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Laura Rosenzweig, author of Hollywood’s Spies: The Undercover Surveillance of Nazis in Los Angeles, writes, "The stories about Nazis in Hollywood have only recently come out in recent books, such as “Hitler in Los Angeles” and “Hollywood’s Spies.” But no one has yet written about the Japanese infiltration of Hollywood, and I think it’s important. I’m glad Drabkin is writing about this."

Plus note, Captain Ellis M. Zacharias of ONI was certainly busy, and he had some unclear public social contact regarding suspected informal spy Emily Hall Tremaine (previously Spreckels and Von Romberg) (1908-87) when she lived in Santa Barbara before WWII. This has been covered extensively in AFP's sister publication, The Connecticut Centinal. (Emily was all over the American newspapers leading up to the 1940 presidential election in the "He's a Nazi, no SHE IS" divorce action which put the spotlight on social set Nazi supporters in California, San Francisco and San Diego / Coronado. Was this, in part, a Zacharias psych-out operation like he pursued elsewhere? Emily's brother-in-law worked directly for Zacharias, so who knows.)

Lastly, on the historical ONI front, let's hope the San Francisco District Naval Intelligence archive, the Nazi-related files, are declassified soon! THE BIG QUESTION: Who has kept these historically important files classified and why?