Washington: Justice Department reveals 147 held in connection to 9-11

The United States is still holding at least 147 people rounded up as part of the investigation into the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and 18 are not represented by lawyers, the Justice Department said Friday, responding to a court order requesting the figures.

U.S. District Court Judge Gladys Kessler ordered the Justice Department on May 31 to update and clarify data about people being detained after civil liberties groups sued for more information.

The groups, which included the Center for National Security Studies and the American Civil Liberties Union, demanded the names of all those being held, information on where they are being held and more current numbers. Kessler has yet to rule on whether the government’s decision to keep secret the names and locations of detainees is legal, but she ordered the release of the current number of detainees.

Virginia: Lindh’s lawyers say client did not have Miranda rights

U.S. officials ignored John Walker Lindh’s legal rights in Afghanistan and statements the U.S.-born Taliban soldier made there should be kept from his trial, defense lawyers said Friday.

The written pleading said several U.S. interrogators failed to advise Lindh of his right to counsel, took no action when he requested a lawyer and never told him his parents had hired an attorney for him in the United States.

During an FBI interrogation after his capture, Lindh signed a statement waiving his right to counsel, but only in hopes it would help him escape horrendous conditions of confinement, the lawyers said.

Lindh’s statements last December in Afghanistan were relied on heavily in his indictment, the prosecution and defense have acknowledged. He is charged with conspiring to murder Americans and aiding the Taliban and al-Qaida and could face life in prison if convicted of the most serious charges.

Maryland: FBI probes possibility anthrax smuggled out of Fort Detrick

The FBI is investigating the possibility that someone secretly grew the deadly anthrax mailed to politicians and media outlets last fall at an Army laboratory in Hagerstown, Md., and further refined it at home, a government source and a scientist said.

The theory that anthrax was smuggled out of the biological warfare defense lab at Fort Detrick is one of several under consideration by the FBI, but none has been assigned more prominence than the others, a U.S. law enforcement official said Thursday.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, indicated that no arrests were imminent and that authorities remain largely frustrated in the lack of progress in their investigation.