Quote:
Originally Posted by Flames Fan, Ph.D.
How do you invoke a state secrets privilege in relation to a person who wasn't the one you *thought* you were apprehending?
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The privilege is basically that any discussion of the events at issue would compromise state secrets, so the identity of the person wouldn't really matter. The claim would obviously be based upon incidents that ocurred under CIA command, which I assume would be highly confidential. I assume that the argument was something along the lines of 'if he presents these facts we'll have to present other facts to defend ourselves, and those facts would compromise the state in x manner'.
An interesting thing I just thought of in relation to this privilege and the wikileaks releases is whether or not a failure to adequately protect the confidential information would cause the privilege to be waived. That's how it works with most other forms of privilege, there's a duty to be diligent in guarding the information. I'd have to assume the ACLU has already latched onto that idea and will be running with it at some point in the near future.