In January 2006, Fitzgerald advised Libby's lawyers that White House e-mails from 2003, possibly relevant to the Plame case, had not been preserved as part of the normal archiving process: http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/...
My question -- Did Fitzgerald take any action to determine whether such messages were recoverable -- or did he simply take the White House at its word and drop further inquiry?
Everyone seems to assume that the disclosure of massive amounts of missing e-mail will stir Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald back into action. But apparently he has long known that possibly relevant e-mails were "missing" -- and nothing in the public record hints at any aggressive action by him to determine whether such messages were retrievable.
In January 2006, Fitzgerald advised Libby's lawyers that White House e-mails from 2003, possibly relevant to the Plame case, had not been preserved as part of the "normal archiving process": http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/...
To date, there has been no hint that Fitzgerald took steps to determine whether such e-mails could be found by means outside the "normal archiving process". Did he do so, but manage to keep his activities as to such search (and attempts at forensic reconstruction) completely secret? Or did he simply accept the White House's assurances that the messages could never be found -- and let the matter drop?
If Fitzgerald did take extra steps (using forensic IT specialists) to find the messages and failed to find anything, this might indicate that at least some key e-mails are indeed lost for good. If, however, Fitzgerald did not make any attempts to go beyond White House assurances of unavailability, Congress might want to consider asking him just why he decided not to pursue the matter further.