WP: Paper Said to Show NSA Spying Given to Post Reporter in 2004

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/02/AR2006030201852.html

Paper Said to Show NSA Spying Given to Post Reporter in 2004

By Carol D. Leonnig
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 3, 2006; Page A04

A classified document that an Islamic charity says is evidence of illegal government eavesdropping on its phone calls and e-mails was provided in 2004 to a Washington Post reporter, who returned it when the FBI demanded it back a few months later.

According to a source familiar with the case, the document indicated that the National Security Agency intercepted telephone conversations in the spring of 2004 between a director of the al-Haramain Islamic Foundation and lawyers for the foundation in the District.

Al-Haramain, a Saudi group that once operated in Oregon, sued the Bush administration in federal court this week, alleging it was a victim of President Bush's secret domestic eavesdropping program. Its lawyers asked a judge to privately review the classified material, which the organization contends would help prove its claim.

Treasury Department officials inadvertently provided the classified document, which was marked "top secret" and dated May 24, 2004, to al-Haramain lawyers that same month, according to FBI correspondence with The Post. Treasury was investigating the foundation for possible links to terrorists and soon designated the group a terrorist organization.