Post September 11 trial 'hindered by Washington bureaucracy'

PROSECUTORS in the first major terror trial after September 11 were hindered by superiors from presenting some of their most powerful evidence.

This includes testimony from an al-Qaida leader and video footage showing Osama bin Laden's European operatives casing American landmarks, Justice Department memos show.

The department's terrorism unit "provided no help of any kind in this prosecution," the US Attorney's office in Detroit wrote in one of the memos, which detail bitter divisions between front-line prosecutors and their superiors in Washington.