JUSTICE

By Elaine Shannon

It's like a scene from a bad Washington movie. Squads of investigators are prowling the halls of Justice and the FBI, interrogating officials high and low about a recent spate of unauthorized, though unspectacular, Justice-beat leaks. Some Justice officials defend the plumbing expeditions as necessary to stem revelations of classified and investigative information. Others deride the internal probes as a panicky overreaction by mid-level officials who are making key decisions while the department's top management jobs (Deputy AG, Associate AG and Assistant AG for the criminal division) lie vacant.

"It's a pain in the neck," says a veteran Justice hand about the proliferation of plumbers' squads. "Some days, we spend a lot of the day being interviewed." Among the offending disclosures: a Washington Post story by Bob Woodward and Brian Duffy that detailed U.S. intelligence intercepts of a covert Chinese-government scheme to funnel illicit money into political campaigns; revelations of plea-bargain negotiations between Justice and Hani Abdel Rahim Hussein al-Sayegh, a Saudi dissident nabbed in Canada and suspected of driving a lookout car for the truck bombers who killed 19 U.S. servicemen in Dhahran last June; reports that alleged CIA killer Mir Aimal Kansi gave a confession to FBI agents who snared him in Pakistan; and the still unsolved leak of Richard Jewell's name.

Attorney General JANET RENO is especially steamed over the stories last month that FBI Director LOUIS FREEH had advised her to seek a special prosecutor to probe possible campaign-finance-law violations by Democratic fund raisers. Reno allies grumble that the leak seemed aimed at shoring up Freeh's flagging support among congressional Republicans. Freeh allies counter that the leak hurt him more than it did her and must have come from Justice. While the probes are undermining morale and chilling official press contacts, insiders give slim odds that the Justice plumbers will actually catch any leakers. Reason? Nobody's talking.

--By Elaine Shannon