Chicago US Attorney Says Book Partly Blames Him for Sept. 11

[BlueJessamine]

Chicago US Attorney Says Book Partly Blames Him for Sept. 11

http://www.abajournal.com/news/chicago_us_atty._says_book_partly_blames_him_for_sept._11_threatens_suit/

By Debra Cassens Weiss

The corruption-fighting U.S. attorney in Chicago is threatening to sue a publisher over an upcoming book that, in his view, partly blames him for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago sent a letter to HarperCollins warning that he will sue if the book Triple Cross defames him or casts him in a false light, according to the Associated Press and the Chicago Sun-Times. Fitzgerald said the book is “a deliberate lie masquerading as the truth."

The book covers intelligence failures before Sept. 11 and includes information on Fitzgerald’s New York terrorism prosecutions in the 1990s. The book claims Fitzgerald filed a false court affidavit and says he and other officials discredited al-Qaida evidence, according to a press release summarized by the Sun-Times.

Fitzgerald told AP and the Sun-Times that the book goes beyond normal criticism that goes with the territory for public officials.

“The book lied about the facts and alleged that I deliberately misled the courts and the public in ways that in part caused the deaths in the 1998 embassy bombing attacks and in the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001," he said.

The book’s author, Peter Lance, told AP that Fitzgerald is trying to kill the book with baseless allegations. "Patrick Fitzgerald accuses me of making charges in the book that I never made," Lance said. "At the same time, he continually fails to respond to the substantive allegations documented in 604 pages, 1,425 end notes and 32 pages of documentary appendices."