We got this email today from two nationally prominent lawyers. It isn't for real, but we didn't know that when we read it. What's scary as you read it is that it could so easily be true with this Administration. [we deleted the name of the wire service for liability purposes and any spacing glitches are our's]

We should also mention that it fooled the higher-ups of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers as well--by the time it was discovered to be a hoax (by astute NACDL Media Affairs Director Dan Dodson), one call to a congressman had already been made to express concern and a staff meeting was in the works as to how to respond.

Update: We were just told that the Congressman mentioned above believed it too and made some phone calls of his own before learning it was a hoax.

Ashcroft Assails Disclosure Rules

Filed at 11:13 p.m.

WASHINGTON, Sept. 26 -- Calling the nation's criminal disclosure laws "a grave threat to national security," Attorney General John Ashcroft today called for an overhaul of the rules that allow criminal defendants and their lawyers access to evidence against them before trial.

The Attorney General indicated that the Justice Department would be submitting "significant" amendments to the disclosure rules to Congress by early next week, and that he expected "immediate" Congressional approval.

"To give them evidence in advance of a trial is to place bombs in the hands of terrorists," Ashcroft said.

Ashcroft did not specifically mention the name of Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called "20th hijacker" now facing the death penalty for his alleged involvement in the September 11 attacks in New York and Virginia. But it was widely understood that Ashcroft's comments and the forthcoming Justice Department proposals were a reaction to news that prosecutors had given Moussaoui 48 classified FBI reports that, in the words of presiding judge Leonie M. Brinkema, "could compromise significant United States national security interests."

Ashcroft noted that the disclosure of these classified reports was an error by prosecutors, and that the existing disclosure rules did not actually require the classified reports to be turned over to the accused terrorist. But Ashcroft defended the proposed changes as "necessary" and "long overdue," even if they were not actually responsible for the disclosure to Moussaoui. "The fact that somebody may have goofed," Ashcroft said, "should not distract us from the fact that the only reason a prosecutor was even in a position to make this
mistake was because of these liberal disclosure rules that we have in federal court."

Existing rules entitle a criminal defendant to request early disclosure of certain statements, reports, and physical evidence in the hands of prosecutors to help him prepare his defense at trial. Ordinarily the disclosure is made to the defendant's attorney, but because Moussaoui is representing himself, the documents were supplied directly to him.

Ashcroft declined to elaborate on the Justice Department's proposed amendments, saying that they were still under development. But the "basic idea," Ashcroft said, is that a defendant should not get access to anything in the government's possession unless he can persuade a judge by "clear and convincing evidence" that the item is "absolutely necessary" to his defense and that the national security of the United States would not be "in any way compromised" by the disclosure.

Criminal defense lawyers were immediately critical of the Justice Department plan, contending that the disclosure laws were not in need of reform and that it had been a government error, not the existing rules, that caused the disclosure to Moussaoui. "It's the PATRIOT Act all over again," remarked Barry Feinman, executive director of the American Council of Criminal Defense Attorneys, referring to the legislation passed in the weeks after the September 11 terrorist
attacks that made sweeping changes to a variety of criminal statutes and procedural rules. Feinman noted that nothing in Ashcroft's announcement suggested that the proposed changes in disclosure rules would apply only in terrorism cases.

The Attorney General, however, dismissed concerns of the sort voiced by Feinman. "This is the kind of talk that does nothing to strengthen us, but only gives aid and comfort to the enemy," Ashcroft said.

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Once again, the above article is a hoax.