Fired CIA Officer Denies Leaking Classified Information

By: Vaughn Ververs
Topics: Media Issues

(AP Photo/CNN, HO)

As we've been debating the issue of Mary McCarthy, the CIA officer fired last week, we'd be remiss by not noting for the record the denials made by her attorney in The Washington Post this morning. McCarthy, who had reportedly been fired for leaking classified information to reporters, including The Post's Dana Priest, is now saying those reports are inaccurate. From The Post this a.m.:

A lawyer representing fired CIA officer Mary O. McCarthy said yesterday that his client did not leak any classified information and did not disclose to Washington Post reporter Dana Priest the existence of secret CIA-run prisons in Eastern Europe for suspected terrorists.

The statement by Ty Cobb, a lawyer in the Washington office of Hogan & Hartson who said he was speaking for McCarthy, came on the same day that a senior intelligence official said the agency is not asserting that McCarthy was a key source of Priest's award-winning articles last year disclosing the agency's secret prisons.

McCarthy was fired because the CIA concluded that she had undisclosed contacts with journalists, including Priest, in violation of a security agreement. That does not mean she revealed the existence of the prisons to Priest, Cobb said.

And more:

Though McCarthy acknowledged having contact with reporters, a senior intelligence official confirmed yesterday that she is not believed to have played a central role in The Post's reporting on the secret prisons. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing personnel matters.