The visionary chemist Sidney Gottlieb was the CIA’s master magician and gentlehearted torturer, the agency’s “poisoner in chief.” As head of the MK-ULTRA mind control project, he directed brutal experiments at secret prisons on three continents.
He made pills, powders, and potions that could kill or maim without a trace, including some intended for Fidel Castro and other foreign leaders.
He paid prostitutes to lure clients to CIA-run bordellos, where they were secretly dosed with mind-altering drugs.
His experiments spread LSD across the United States, making him a hidden godfather of the 1960s counterculture.
For years he was the chief supplier of spy tools used by CIA officers around the world.