Emails Reveals Attempt To Hide Bin Laden Photos

An email released Monday shows that 11 days after Osama bin Laden was killed in 2001, and 10 days after the Associated Press requested information, a top U.S. military special operations officer ordered for all evidence in regards his death to be destroyed or turned in to the CIA.

The AP obtained the email under the freedom of information request by a conservative legal group called Judicial Watch. The group released the email on Monday.

In the email Admiral William McRaven, head of the U.S. Special Operations Command, told military officers on May 13, 2011 that photos of bin Laden's remains should have been sent to the CIA or already destroyed, according to the AP.

On May 2, 2011, Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan by a special operations, and one day after the AP asked the Special Operations Command's Freedom of Information/Privacy Act Division office for "copies of all e-mails sent from and to the U.S. government account or accounts."

Under the Federal Records Act, "the agency is obliged to preserve the material sought" even if the request is later rejected, the AP reported. McRaven's order came 10 days after the AP placed their requested, which was responded to two days later through an email which said their request was being processed.

The email which surfaced Monday is the first piece of evidence showing the actual order given by McRaven, the AP reported. A draft report by the Pentagon's inspector general first disclosed McRaven's secret order last July, but the reference was not contained in the inspector general's final report.

The email reads: "One particular item that I want to emphasize is photos; particularly UBLs remains. At this point - all photos should have been turned over to the CIA; if you still have them destroy them immediately or get them," the AP reported.

According to the AP, a CIA spokesman said in a statement that "documents related to the raid were handled in a manner consistent with the fact that the operation was conducted under the direction of the CIA director," at the time the request was placed by the AP.

The CIA statement also said "records of a CIA operation such as the raid, which were created during the conduct of the operation by persons acting under the authority of the CIA director, are CIA records."

Tom Fitton, president of the Judicial Watch group, said the email "is a smoking gun, revealing both contempt for the rule of law and the American people's right to know," according to the AP.