4th Circuit Ruling Stalls Probe of Saudi Money Transfer

A decision yesterday by a federal appeals court in Richmond, Va., will delay the efforts of federal prosecutors who are seeking information about money transfers made by a now-defunct Saudi-backed foundation accused of having ties to terrorists.

The court decision involves a long-running grand jury investigation into whether a cluster of Islamic organizations centered in Herndon, Va., funneled money to a number of terrorist groups in the 1990s. The six-year investigation has resulted in several indictments, but also has come under criticism from Muslim leaders.

One once-prominent organization, the SAAR Foundation, which is now defunct, has racked up $500,000 in contempt-of-court fines for its noncooperation with the grand jury probe. Prosecutors have tried to get documents detailing SAAR's money transfers by subpoenaing the group's one-time attorney, Bruce Hopkins, of the Kansas City-based firm Polsinelli Shalton Flanigan Suelthaus PC. A lawyer for Mr. Hopkins has argued that any of Mr. Hopkins's records that have been subpoenaed are protected by the attorney-client privilege.

In the decision yesterday, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which sits in Richmond, had been expected to decide whether the attorney-client privilege extended to defunct organizations. Instead it sidestepped the issue, telling a lower court to determine first whether the documents in Mr. Hopkins's possession seemed to detail a potential crime, in which case prosecutors are entitled to them, regardless of any attorney-client privilege.

Prosecutors have been seeking the documents from Mr. Hopkins for well over a year now. However, the precise scope of the dispute is murky because the proceedings in the district court were conducted in secret.

Reached by telephone yesterday, Mr. Hopkins said he was "trying to stay as far away from this as possible" and declined to comment further.

Prosecutors did score a victory yesterday when the appeals court threw out an effort by a onetime subsidiary of SAAR, Mar-Jac Investments, Inc., to fight the grand jury subpoena seeking documents from Mr. Hopkins.