A top FBI lawyer claims that his departments agents did not abuse their authority when they seized the phone records of two journalists. FBI Director Robert Mueller said sorry to The New York Times and The Washington Post for obtaining phone records of reporters in Indonesia in 2004.

Valerie E. Caproni, the FBI's general counsel said it was all a terrible mistake and nothing to do with the department breaking any law.

However it was all a bit dodgy. Normally top Justice Department officials must approve such requests and it's up to a grand jury to allow them.
Instead the FBI simply wrote a letter to the phone company asking for the records, saying only that it was an emergency.

Caproni said investigators may just have been trying to be helpful, despite the fact there was no emergency.

Since then the FBI has vague 'emergency' letters. Now, Caproni said, investigators seeking urgent information must write a memo explaining the emergency and the request must be signed off by a supervisor. X

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