Appeals court allows wiretapping evidence

SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 27 (UPI) -- A U.S. appeals court has refused to block a federal judge from admitting top secret evidence in a lawsuit over the government's warrantless wiretapping program.

The lawsuit seeks to determine whether a president may bypass Congress to spy on Americans without a court order.

Wired reported Friday that the San Francisco appeals court decision affirms U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker's decision in January to admit as evidence a classified document allegedly showing that two American lawyers for the now-defunct al-Haramain Islamic Foundation charity were electronically eavesdropped upon without warrants by the Bush administration in 2004.

The lawyers -- Wendell Belew and Asim Ghafoor -- sued the federal government after the U.S. Treasury Department accidentally released the secret memo to them. The document was ordered removed from the case after President George W. Bush's administration declared the memo a state secret.

Wired said the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' decision means the lawyers' case is the only lawsuit likely to litigate the merits of a challenge to Bush's secret eavesdropping program after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"We're trying to establish a legal precedent: A rule that the president must comply with legislation passed by Congress," said Jon Eisenberg, the attorney for the two lawyers. "The president is not above the law. This case is important to establish a legal precedent."