March 10, 1984

Former Sheriff Harold White of Marion County, who was elected on a pledge to clean up drug trafficking, was sentenced today to 10 years in prison for lying to a grand jury and taking money from a drug dealer. Rey Orta, a drug dealer granted immunity for cooperating, testified that he paid Mr. White about $1,000 a month for about 18 months, in return for which the sheriff would tell him when the authorities were investigating his dealings. Federal District Judge James H. Meredith sentenced Mr. White to five years for conspiracy and five years for lying to the jury.

Art dealers and gallery owners are reporting new thefts by an indicted Manhattan man in what they say is one of the largest New York City art swindles in decades. Since the indictment was announced Tuesday, the dealers and gallery owners have called prosecutors to report thefts of art and cash by the suspect, Dennis R. Anderson. Prosecutors said the total losses amounted to about $2 million. Among the latest works reported missing were at least five paintings, including works by the American artists Milton Avery, Charles Burchfield and William Glackens. Earlier, prosecutors reported a missing painting by the French artist Jean Dubuffet and said the swindle also involved works by Degas, Matisse and Seurat.

Three members of the Senate Judiciary Committee suggested today that Edwin Meese 3d should return for questioning about whether he knew that Ronald Reagan's 1980 political campaign had obtained information from within President Carter's camp. Senators Carl Levin of Michigan and Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, both Democrats, and Charles McC. Mathias Jr. of Maryland, a Republican, proposed that Mr. Meese, the Presidential Counselor, should appear before the committee again before it acted on his nomination to be Attorney General. However, Senator Strom Thurmond, the South Carolina Republican who heads the committee, said through an aide that Mr. Meese had declined an invitation to return. Reagan Assails Questions Mark Goodin, Mr. Thurmond's press secretary, said the Senator regarded the hearing record as closed and had advised Senators with further questions to direct them to Mr. Meese's White House office.

The national unemployment rate fell an additional two- tenths of a point in February, to 7.7 percent, the Labor Department reported today. It was the 15th straight month in which the overall unemployment rate has either fallen or remained unchanged since the recession high of 10.6 percent in November 1982. At the end of December 1983, the Reagan Administration forecast the 7.7 percent rate would be achieved in the closing months of this year. Analysts said they were particularly impressed with the ability of the economy to generate 700,000 new jobs in February, absorbing nearly 500,000 new workers and 200,000 more people who had been unemployed.

Reagan Administration officials said today that United States military activity in Central America was being stepped up in advance of El Salvador's presidential election March 25. Officials said the actions included new small-scale United States military maneuvers in Honduras; doubling to 1,700 the number of United States military people in Honduras, and arming United States military advisers in El Salvador with heavier weapons to protect themselves. The officials said that small United States ground units would conduct limited maneuvers, some of which will take place in the region of Honduras between El Salvador and Nicaragua, from now until the start of a large exercise in June. The exercises are intended to intimidate Salvadoran guerrillas and their Nicaraguan backers, one official said.