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Judge Blocks Release of Luis

Posada Carriles Interviews

A federal judge has denied media access to a journalist's decade-old taped interviews with Cuban exile Luis Posada Carriles before his trial on charges of lying about orchestrating hotel bombings in Cuba.

But U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone, who is presiding over Posada's case in El Paso, Texas, ruled this week that The Miami Herald, Associated Press and other news media may challenge, on a case-by-case basis, the government's effort to seal sensitive documents before trial.

Posada, a one-time CIA operative who lives in Miami, faces trial in February on charges of perjury, obstruction of justice and making false statements.

The Justice Department sought a protective order on the handling of certain pretrial discovery evidence to be turned over to the defendant.

Posada's lawyer, Arturo V. Hernandez, opposed such protection -- including journalist Ann Louise Bardach's taped interviews with Posada in which he allegedly confessed to his involvement in the Havana hotel bombings.

-- JAY WEAVER