Plans for Terror Inquiries Still Fall Short, Report Says (Justice Report)

[Khephra]

The Justice Department, criticized for its treatment of hundreds of illegal immigrants jailed after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has not done enough to avoid a repeat by spelling out clear criteria for determining who is considered a terrorist suspect, an internal report concluded today.

In its report, the Justice Department inspector general's office said federal authorities had not developed adequate plans for classifying illegal immigrants arrested in terror investigations to ensure that those with no ties to terrorism would be cleared quickly and adequate F.B.I. resources would be devoted to such investigations.

The inspector general's report offered a mixed verdict on the progress the authorities had made in avoiding the pitfalls surrounding the arrests of more than 700 illegal immigrants after the 9/11 attacks.

Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, said the inspector general had "properly given both the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security an `incomplete' " in meeting their pledges to fix the systematic problems surrounding the Sept. 11 detentions.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/09/politics/09DETA.html