We reported Tuesday that Attorney General John Ashcroft was rebuked by a federal judge in Detroit for violating a gag order in a terrorism case. The LA Times reports that Ashcroft apologized to the Court.

In a Nov. 26 letter to the court that [Judge] Rosen unsealed Tuesday, Ashcroft said his remarks were "entirely inadvertent," and said he didn't intend to disregard the order or to disrupt the court proceedings.

"I regret making these statements," the attorney general wrote. "I made a mistake in making statements that could have been considered by the court to be a breach of the court's order. And for that I apologize to the court and counsel."

Legal ethics specialists said they could not recall a time when a sitting attorney general was the recipient of professional discipline by a court. "It is extremely unusual for an attorney general to breach an order, and extremely unusual to apologize for it," said Deborah Rhode, a professor of law at Stanford Law School. "It is unusual for this attorney general to apologize for anything connected with national security."

You can read the Judge's Order here (pdf file).