Federal officials in Dallas mistakenly disclosed classified counter-terrorism information in a breach of national security that could also threaten one of the country's biggest terrorism prosecution cases, newly unsealed court records show.
The blunder exposed secret wiretap requests that commonly include classified information from U.S. agencies, foreign intelligence reports and confidential sources.
The criminal case involves officials of the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, a now-defunct Islamic charity with alleged ties to terrorists. Its assets were frozen by the Treasury Department three months after the Sept. 11 attacks.
In announcing the seizure of the charity's funds, President Bush told a Rose Garden gathering in December 2001 that the charity was among those who "do business with terror."
Disclosure that the government erred in sharing secret intelligence on the case came to light when court files were unsealed this week. The mistake occurred nearly a year ago but was not previously disclosed. KTVT-TV in Dallas first reported the security breach late Tuesday.
The unsealed records, included in boxes of selected classified data turned over to defense lawyers in April, included what a federal prosecutor called "extraordinarily sensitive information."
But it was more than four months before FBI agents discovered, on Aug. 12, that the documents included still-secret data not intended for release.
When authorities scrambled to retrieve the secret documents from a courthouse room reserved for defense lawyers, a court security official blocked their access, records show.
According to a government legal brief filed in the case, the erroneous disclosures represent the first such misstep in the 27-year history of the nation's top-secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court. Defense lawyers have always been denied access to applications and affidavits justifying warrants for national security surveillance.
Such documents commonly include highly sensitive and classified information from a variety of U.S. intelligence agencies, foreign intelligence services and confidential sources, prosecutors acknowledged.
It was not immediately clear what defense lawyers learned in the case. All sides are barred from discussing the still-classified information.
But a protracted legal tussle over the documents produced a number of sealed motions. Their release provided clues to the extent of the security breach.
