CIA operative investigation update

[Donutboy 0]

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.

Sources said the CIA is angry about the circulation of a still-classified document to conservative news outlets suggesting Plame had a role in arranging her husband's trip to Africa for the CIA. The document, written by a State Department official who works for its Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), describes a meeting at the CIA where the Niger trip by Wilson was discussed, said a senior administration official who has seen it.

CIA officials have challenged the accuracy of the INR document, the official said, because the agency officer identified as talking about Plame's alleged role in arranging Wilson's trip could not have attended the meeting.

Read the rest of the story here

There are still some things unsettling about this issue, but maybe justice will be served.

[Tiger Al 0]

That reminds me, I've got to re-send my e-mail to DoJ asking about the progress of this investigation. They don't have anything about it on their website. They never replied to my initial one I sent about 3 weeks ago except for an automated response saying that my e-mail was very important to them.

[TitanTiger 21,219]

It's a never ending source of amusement to me what Donut chooses to highlight within an article to suit his agenda. Time and again he has made insinuations or outright claims that the DoJ is in the administration's backpocket and was squelching the investigation. However, from the very article he posted, it seems that isn't true. How about these highlights:

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...

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

[Ranger12 53]

Just what I was thinking TT.

[TitanTiger 21,219]

That In-Bush's-Back-Pocket Attorney General of ours just keeps 'em coming. But don't underestimate the power of Democrats to dig for something to continue pissing and moaning about (a corollary to the axiom Never Underestimate The Power of Stupid People In Large Groups):

Ashcroft recuses himself from CIA leak probe

[Ranger12 53]

Ashcroft just recused himself from the inverstigation. Guess he does not want anybody to doubt the integrity of the investigation huh?

[Tiger Al 0]

Ashcroft just recused himself from the inverstigation. Guess he does not want anybody to doubt the integrity of the investigation huh?

If that were the case, I'd think that he would've done that initially to avoid even the appearance of impropriety.