17 June arrest file
Police
The five men, their equipment and address-book links to Hunt and CRP are the opening exhibits. They made a 'third-rate burglary' unsustainable as a full story.
Watergate is evidence-rich: cash, testimony, contemporaneous recordings and a Supreme Court opinion.
The 18½-minute gap is a famous hole inside a file that is otherwise thick.
Exhibits
CRP cash trail
Ledger
Slush-fund and money-order stories published by the Post and later proved in court tied intelligence operations to the re-election committee.
Dean's Senate testimony
Testimony
June 1973 hearings described the cover-up from inside the White House. Corroboration later came from tapes, not only from Dean's memory.
White House tapes
Recording
The taping system Butterfield revealed is the core documentary file. The 23 June 1972 smoking-gun conversation ended the political defence.
United States v. Nixon
Court
The 24 July 1974 opinion required production of tapes. It is the legal exhibit that converted executive privilege from a shield into a limited claim.
18½-minute gap
Recording
A June 1972 tape with a notorious erasure. It is evidence of destruction or accident inside a cover-up, not a reason to doubt that a cover-up existed.
How strong is the record?
Cover-up consensus95
Tapes and convictions leave no serious dispute that a cover-up occurred.
Nixon's personal criminal trial20
The pardon blocked a presidential dock. Mixed status follows.
Documentary thickness92
Hearings, tapes and court records are among the thickest political files in English.
Deep Throat side mystery90
Felt's 2005 identification closed the source question; it was never the main case.
The evidence file is a mountain with one famous gap and one missing presidential trial.
Public-record encyclopedia. Not legal advice. Not a how-to. Graphic detail is withheld. Wars belong in a separate atlas.