NationStates Jolt Archive

Rice, Others Supoenaed in AIPAC Spy Case

November 3, 2007; A federal judge yesterday issued a rare ruling that ordered Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and more than 10 other prominent current and former government officials to testify on behalf of two pro-Israel lobbyists accused of violating the Espionage Act at their upcoming criminal trial.

The opinion by U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III in Alexandria directed that subpoenas be issued to officials who include Rice, national security adviser Stephen J. Hadley, former high-level Department of Defense officials Paul D. Wolfowitz and Douglas J. Feith, and Richard L. Armitage, the former deputy secretary of state.
...
Prosecutors have been trying to quash the subpoenas during secret hearings and in classified legal briefs, but Ellis wrote that the testimony could help "exculpate the defendants by negating the criminal states of mind the government must prove.''

Sources: Yahoo/Washington Post/OccNEWS
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/02/AR2007110201554_pf.html

all this reminds me of the Reagan years... :D

Legal experts said it would be highly unusual for such a parade of senior officials to testify at a criminal trial. Although former president Ronald Reagan and former attorney general Edwin I. Meese III testified at a trial arising from the Iran-contra affair in the 1980s, judges usually decline to grant such subpoenas on the grounds that high-level officials are too busy
You sayin' I ain't busy? At least those motherfuckers can still pay their rent if they take a few days off work...

Prosecutors also might invoke some sort of privilege and refuse to allow the officials to testify on the grounds that it could reveal sensitive information about national security and U.S. foreign policy. That would likely lead to sanctions from the judge, which could include dismissals of the indictment.
For some reason I think that this will be the outcome, and quietly at that.