News & Politics - Justice Dept. Continues Probe of Possible WH leak of CIA Agent's Identity

ceilirose · 12-26-2003, 06:20 PM

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2003Dec25.html

Quote:

Leaks Probe Is Gathering Momentum

By Mike Allen and Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, December 26, 2003; Page A01

The Justice Department has added a fourth prosecutor to the team investigating the leak of an undercover CIA officer's identity, while the FBI has said a grand jury may be called to take testimony from administration officials, sources close to the case said.

Administration and CIA officials said they have seen signs in the past few weeks that the investigation continues intensively behind closed doors, even though little about the investigation has been publicly said or seen for months.

According to administration officials and people familiar with some of the interviews, FBI agents apparently started their White House questioning with top figures -- including President Bush's senior adviser, Karl Rove -- and then worked down to more junior officials. The agents appear to have a great deal of information and have constructed detailed chronologies of various officials' possible tie to the leak, people familiar with the questioning said.

The Justice Department has added a prosecutor specializing in counterintelligence, joining two other counterintelligence prosecutors and one from Justice's Public Integrity section.

Agents investigating the matter have been increasingly apparent at CIA headquarters in Langley over the past three weeks, officials said. "They are still active," a senior official said.

But sources said the CIA believes that people in the administration continue to release classified information to damage the figures at the center of the controversy, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV and his wife, Valerie Plame, who was exposed as a CIA officer by unidentified senior administration officials for a July 14 column by Robert D. Novak.

Wilson, a prominent critic of the administration over Iraq, has said that was done to retaliate against him for continuing to publicize his conclusion, after a 2002 mission for the CIA, that there was little evidence Iraq had sought uranium in Africa to develop nuclear weapons.

The balance of the article can be found at the above link.

[ 12-26-2003: Message edited ceilirose ]

AlexEvans · 12-26-2003, 06:58 PM

Wow... a former ambassador started working for the CIA? Who'd have ever guessed!!! [img]smilies/eek.gif[/img]

Except, um, everyone in Washington apparently knew.

What I'd really like to know is how they got chosen for the mission to Africa.

[img]smilies/abduct.gif[/img] [img]smilies/read.gif[/img]

ceilirose · 12-27-2003, 04:35 AM

Originally posted by Abducted Bookworm:

Quote:

Wow... a former ambassador started working for the CIA? Who'd have ever guessed!!! [img]smilies/eek.gif[/img]

You're missing the point of the story. Outing an intelligence agent is a federal crime punishable by fines and/or a jail term. Are you saying that a member of the White House staff (if the leak came from there) should be above the law? No one should be...but maybe you think differently. *shrug*

Quote:

Except, um, everyone in Washington apparently knew.

Sources please ..other than newsmax.com or Faux..excuse me Fox News.

ETA - If you're talking about Novak's column where he tried to justify what he did..well if I were in his position I would be in major CYA mode as well.

Also I read in another story that six journalists were given this 'hot' scoop. Novak was the only one stupid enough to print it. The others apparently realized that they could be breaking the law and withheld the information.

Quote:

What I'd really like to know is how they got chosen for the mission to Africa.

Who are they? Are you talking about Wilson? Well I know that Wilson won't be a financial contributor to Bush like he was in '00.

[ 12-27-2003: Message edited ceilirose ]

*Lauren · 12-27-2003, 04:48 AM

Wasn't it the ambaassdor's wife that was the CIA agent?

ceilirose · 12-27-2003, 05:00 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by *Lauren:
Wasn't it the ambaassdor's wife that was the CIA agent?

Absolutely..her outing is the important point in all of this. Her life and her contact's lives overseas are the ones that were put in danger with this information.

ceilirose · 12-30-2003, 01:46 PM

Ashcroft has recused himself from this case. As for what that means in terms of any member of the WH staff being involved..we'll just have to wait and see.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/ID/3840566/

SuperDeluxe · 12-30-2003, 02:46 PM

Outting a Undercover CIA agent bad bad bad bad...

Doing it in retaliation against the former ambassador really bad.

Nail who ever did this to the cross..thats straight up treason.

ceilirose · 01-03-2004, 05:42 AM

An update on this case..the FBI is asking Administration officials to release journalists from their confidentiality agreements to further this case along..even Karl Rove. It could be an interesting few months for Bush & Co.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/arti...570189,00.html

Enigma, I.C. · 01-03-2004, 11:55 AM

A way will be found to bury this story. The liberal media (sarcasm) will dutifully ignore it and everyone will forget about it after a couple of weeks.

Papri · 01-04-2004, 12:13 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Enigma, I.C.:
A way will be found to bury this story. The liberal media (sarcasm) will dutifully ignore it and everyone will forget about it after a couple of weeks.

As with anything controversial. Play it down, nobody needs to know - and then they wonder why people find the media outrageously selective in what they choose to broadcast.

ros2nz · 01-04-2004, 11:53 PM

Quote:

As with anything controversial. Play it down, nobody needs to know - and then they wonder why people find the media outrageously selective in what they choose to broadcast.

WORD.

ceilirose · 01-23-2004, 07:40 AM

A grand jury has been appointed in this case. Right before the New Year John Ashcroft recused himself from the case and the Justice Department appointed a federal prosecutor to continue the investigation.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/arti...581456,00.html

Quote:

Grand Jury Hears Plame Case
Testimony begins in front of a grand jury in the investigation into whether the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame was improperly leaked to the press
By JOHN DICKERSON AND VIVECA NOVAK

Thursday, Jan. 22, 2004
Sources with knowledge of the case tell TIME that behind closed doors at the E. Barrett Prettyman federal courthouse, nearby the Capitol, a grand jury began hearing testimony Wednesday in the investigation of who leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame to columnist Robert Novak and other journalists.

Prosecutors are believed to be starting with third-party witnesses, people who were not directly involved in the leak of Plame's identity. Plame's husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, claims that the leak was an act of retaliation against him for undercutting Bush's weapons-of-mass-destruction rationale for going to war in Iraq. Soon enough, witnesses with more direct knowledge will be called to testify, and a decision to subpoena journalists for their testimony will also be made. In December, the FBI asked some administration staffers to sign a waiver releasing reporters from confidentiality agreements in connection with any conversations they had about the Wilson affair. Novak's attorney, Jim Hamilton, had no comment about the latest developments.

Grand juries aren't always used in criminal probes, but they are the preferred way to go in cases with potential political fallout, if only to lend credibility to the result. One conclusion to be drawn from this latest step, said one lawyer familiar with the case, is that investigators clearly have a sense of how the case is shaping up. "They clearly have a sense of what's going on and can ask intelligent questions" to bring the grand jury up to speed. A grand jury is not a trial jury, but is used as an investigative tool and to decide whether to bring indictments in a case.

Anyone who's subpoenaed in the inquiry, noted the lawyer, can be almost certain that prosecutors aren't contemplating indicting him or her. Subpoenas are rarely sent to the targets of an investigation, and if they are, the recipients must be told in advance that they are considered targets�at which point they would almost certainly cite the 5th Amendment and refuse to answer questions.

A huge unanswered question in this case is whether the leaker or leakers knew that Plame was undercover when they gave her identity away. That is a necessary element for any indictment for leaking the name of a covert agent. However, charges could also be brought for making false statements to the FBI, if a guilty party has falsely claimed innocence in interviews with government agents.

It's also possible that prosecutors will learn who perpetrated the leak but won't have enough to bring charges. But true to form, the Bush administration continues to be extremely tight-lipped about the investigation -- even internally. "No one knows what the hell is going on," says someone who could be a witness, "because the administration people are all terrified and the lawyers aren't sharing anything with each other either."

SuperDeluxe · 01-23-2004, 08:23 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Enigma, I.C.:
A way will be found to bury this story. The liberal media (sarcasm) will dutifully ignore it and everyone will forget about it after a couple of weeks.

YOu got to be kidding, if there is a story, the liberal media (not sarcasim) will be blasting it all over the airwaves

ceilirose · 01-23-2004, 08:50 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by SuperDeluxe:


YOu got to be kidding, if there is a story, the liberal media (not sarcasim) will be blasting it all over the airwaves

Then why isn't it? A grand jury investigation that involves high-level Bush Administration officials is news worthy.

OT but have you heard about Republican staff members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committe infiltrating the Democratic oppostion computer files for close to a year? They're accused of passing the copies on to the media.

This may be archived already but it was a front page story in yesterday's Boston Globe:
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/01/22/infiltration_of_files_seen _as_extensive/

Seriously I think besides the great divide in this country between Republicans and Democrats is the great divide between those who think the press is liberal and those of us who refer to it as the SCLM (so-called liberal media).

I haven't had a chance to look at many national newspapers yet today and I may be wrong but I doubt it's going to get alot of press today...they're still fixated on Dean, the anger thing and the Iowa Caucus story.

[ 01-23-2004: Message edited ceilirose ]


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