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Inquiry sought into disappearance of e-mails in interrogations case
Senior Democratic lawmakers and watchdog groups demanded Friday that the Justice Department investigate the disappearance of e-mail messages written by Bush administration lawyers who drafted memos blessing harsh interrogation tactics, saying their absence cast doubt on an ethics report that cleared the lawyers of professional misconduct.
The lost e-mails cover a critical period in 2002 when Justice Department attorneys labored under heavy pressure on a memo that gave the CIA a green light to use simulated drowning, sleep deprivation and other interrogation techniques against al-Qaeda suspects.
"Why were these critical records deleted? Why were they kept from investigators?" Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) said at a hearing Friday.