White House May Have Destroyed Some Emails Relevant To CIA Leak Case

Fitzgerald admits White House may have destroyed some emails relevant to CIA leak case

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Fitzge...have_0201.html

Published: February 1, 2006

RAW STORY has acquired a letter from CIA leak Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald to Vice President Dick Cheney's former Chief of Staff, I. Lewis Libby, who was indicted for allegedly obstructing justice and other charges for his role in the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame.

In the letter, Fitzgerald admits that he has been told some emails from the President and Vice President's offices have been deleted, though he cautions that "no pertinent evidence has been destroyed."

"In an abundance of caution," he writes, "we advise you that we have learned that not all email of the Office of the Vice President and the Executive Office of the President for certain time periods in 2003 was preserved through the normal achiving process on the White House computer system."

The New York Daily News' James Meek reported this morning that "CIA leak prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald collected 10,000 pages of documents - including the most sensitive terrorism memos in the U.S. government - from Vice President Cheney's office, he said in court papers released yesterday.

Libby's lawyers are seeking classified material to aid their defense, which many legal analysts see as an attempt to force the prosecutor's hand in dropping the case or reducing certain charges in the interests of national security.

Meek added: "Fitzgerald, who is fighting Libby's request, said in a letter to Libby's lawyers that many e-mails from Cheney's office at the time of the Plame leak in 2003 have been deleted contrary to White House policy."

The relevant page of that letter follows in image form. To download Fitzgerald's entire letter in PDF form, click here.