US ‘dirty bomber’ is a trial for CIA

[spindrifter]

From The Sunday Times July 29, 2007
Tony Allen-Mills, New York

IT WAS a terrorist trial that seemed to have everything - including a CIA agent testifying in disguise and a mysterious reference to a female donkey. But the long-awaited court appearance of Jose Padilla, a US citizen once known as America’s “dirty bomber”, has turned out to be missing a crucial ingredient - evidence that he actually did anything wrong.

More than two months after federal prosecutors first stood up in a Miami courtroom and depicted Padilla as a would-be jihadist (holy warrior) who with two codefendants was conspiring to “murder, kidnap and maim”, the case has become a potential embarrassment to US security officials.

After weeks of testimony about alleged Al-Qaeda plots, travels to the Middle East and the defendants’ use of secret code words such as “going on a picnic”, the prosecution rested its case with only one piece of physical evidence allegedly linking Padilla to Al-Qaeda – a half filled-out training camp application form that was said to bear his fingerprints.

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Even that broad charge proved difficult to prove as the government presented 23 specialist witnesses, including a CIA covert agent who put on theatrical glasses and a fake beard for his appearance in court. The prosecution also played dozens of tapped phone calls in which the three defendants allegedly used code words to discuss their plans.


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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article2159270.ece