William H. Webster, a longtime U.S. public servant who served as the head of both the FBI and the CIA in a career spanning the late 1970s to the early 1990s, has died. He was 101.
The FBI confirmed his death in a statement Friday.
Webster, who was the only person to have led both agencies, “was a dedicated public servant who spent over 60 years in service to our country, including in the U.S. Navy, as a federal judge, director of the CIA, and his term as our Director from 1978-1987,” the FBI statement said.
WASHINGTON, : William Webster listens to a question from the news media 25 October 2002 during a press conference after being voted chairman of a new Federal Securities and Exchange Commission Public Company Accounting Oversight Board at the SEC in Washington, DC. The SEC, in a divided vote, named Webster, former director of both the FBI and the Central Intelligence Agency, as chairman of a new Public Company Accounting Oversight Board. AFP PHOTO/Shawn THEW (Photo credit should read SHAWN THEW/AFP via Getty Images)
Shawn Thew/AFP via Getty Images
As FBI director, Webster served under presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan.
He then served as CIA director from 1987 to 1991 under Reagan and President George H.W. Bush.
“As the only individual to have led both the FBI and the CIA, Judge Webster’s unwavering integrity and dedication to public service set a standard for leadership in federal law enforcement,” the FBI Agents Association said in a statement.
Webster was born on March 6, 1924 in St. Louis. He attended Amherst College in Massachusetts and earned his law degree at Washington University Law School in St. Louis.
He served as a U.S. Navy lieutenant in both World War II and the Korean War. A practicing attorney in St. Louis from the late 1940s to the late 1950s, Webster went on to serve as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri. In the 1970s, he was appointed a U.S. District Court judge and then a U.S. Court of Appeals judge before taking the FBI director post.
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