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What actually happened, Colson contended, is that after the Wallace shooting, "the President was concerned that the FBI wasn't moving quickly or massively enough," so Colson was directed to keep prodding the agency. He claims he instructed the FBI to guard the Bremer apartment about 7 p.m. "It's patently inconceivable that I'd send Hunt out there after 7 p.m.," Colson protested. "I'd had the apartment cordoned off. Christ, I'm not stupid." Referring to a memo he had written to himself for the record about his call to Hunt, Colson said he had only asked Hunt, "Howard, who do you think is behind this? Is he left or right? Why did he do it?"
Colson has been consistently critical of Dean and Mitchell, and to a lesser degree of Haldeman and Ehrlichman (he calls them "Hans and Fritz"). He admits that he began writing memos to protect himself as soon as Hunt's snooping became known. "The headline was out, COLSON AIDE TIED TO WATERGATE, and I figured I'd be the guy to take it up to the ass. So I dictated all I could remember. If I had been up to some skulduggery, why would I admit the [Hunt] call and put it into a memorandum?" Added Colson: "It's a self-serving memo, obviously. I said, 'Christ, I'm going to be made the culprit,' so I wrote down every contact I'd had with Hunt."