FOX

DOJ: Detention of Immigrants Necessary to Contain 'Sleeper Cells'

WASHINGTON — Call it what you will, but the government's use of military tribunals and its detention of hundreds of people are necessary tools to combat "sleeper cells" of terrorists quietly waiting to strike, a Justice Department lawyer said Wednesday.

Assistant Attorney General Mike Chertoff said the military tribunals will be critical in catching off-guard Al Qaeda terrorists who may have extensive training in how to take advantage of the cracks in the U.S. legal system.

"Woe unto us if we don't learn the lessons of what they're teaching," Chertoff warned the Senate Judiciary Committee.

He said an Al Qaeda manual that was found in the rubble of the 1998 embassy bombings in Africa had lesson plans on the ins and outs of the American legal system, teaching the art of hiding messages during detention visits and telling them how to take advantage of public sentiment during an indictment and trial period.

Chertoff testified that the government was lucky enough to avert a millennium celebration terrorist attack on Los Angeles in December 1999 with the border arrest of Ahmed Ressam. But Americans can't just keep relying on good fortune, he said.

"We could continue this war and hope we get lucky as we did in the Ressam case," Chertoff said. "Or we can pursue a comprehensive and systematic investigative approach that aggressively uses every available, legally permissible investigative technique to identify, disrupt and, if possible, incarcerate and deport sleepers."

But critical senators were concerned the Bush administration had decided to use military tribunals without first consulting with Congress.

"The administration has preferred to go it alone with no authorization or prior consultation with the legislative branch," Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the committee chairman, lamented.

But Chertoff defended the possible use of tribunals -- as well as the controversial monitoring of jailhouse conversations between lawyers and suspects.

"Are we being aggressive and hard-nosed? You bet," Chertoff said. "In the aftermath of Sept. 11, how could we not be?"

Chertoff said only 16 prisoners' conversations with lawyers were being monitored by the government— 12 convicted terrorists and four people held on espionage charges. He said none was being held in connection with the Sept. 11 investigation.

Chertoff's comments came one day after his boss, Attorney General John Ashcroft gave the most thorough public accounting of terrorism arrests so far, naming for the first time nearly all of the 104 people who have been charged with federal crimes.

Ashcroft declined, however, to identify the hundreds of people being held on immigration violations, suggesting some were members of Usama bin Laden's Al Qaeda network.

"I am not interested in providing, when we are at war, a list to Usama bin Laden and the Al Qaeda network of the people we have detained that would make any easier their effort to kill Americans," Ashcroft said.

On another front, law enforcement officials said Wednesday the FBI has asked a team of agents who specialize in looking for new leads in stumped cases to examine anthrax deaths in New York and Connecticut that have baffled authorities.

-- Anonymous, November 29, 2001