The U.S. attorney's office invoked the rarely used Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA) to limit the amount of information disclosed in a case against two men arrested in Albany, N.Y. This comes on the same day media sources revealed that the document the FBI used to link one of the men to terrorists was incorrectly translated. The CIPA is a procedural statute designed to protect against the unauthorized disclosure of classified information during a court case. It applies to information used by both the prosecution and defense. It is mostly used in cases involving alleged terrorists, spies, or others the military charges with crimes. In the Albany case, the prosecution invoked the CIPA to hide information that would be released in advance of the trial. If allowed, CIPA would prohibit the defense from seeing the material and preparing a response. The suspects, Yassin M. Aref and Mohammed Mosharref Hossain, were arrested on charges of money laundering, providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, importing firearms without a license, and conspiracy. The FBI began a sting operation after Hossain sought to borrow money from an FBI informant . The informant then invited Hossain to participate in a money-laundering plot based on the sale of a missile launcher to be used in a terrorist attack. Aref became involved when Hossain asked him to serve as a witness. The FBI started investigating the two men after a notebook recovered from Iraq contained Aref's name and telephone number. The notebook was recovered from what authorities believe was a terrorist camp or insurgent hideout. The FBI mistranslated a word appearing before Aref's name, believing it said "commander" instead of "brother." Prosecutors relied on the "commander" translation, implying it meant that the men were dangerous and should be denied bail. Aref's attorney, Terence Kindlon, cited the irony of invoking CIPA at this point in the process. "They had three press conferences announcing the arrest, one in Washington, D.C., and two in Albany. They put out all this prejudicial damaging information, much of which turns out to be based upon demonstrably false information, and now they want to shut everything down so we can't respond." Hossain's attorney announced he would file a motion seeking the entire notebook that contains Aref's name so that all the information can be reviewed and any inaccuracies in affidavits or documents could be discovered. The government has misused secrecy in past court cases. Recently declassified documents reveal that in a landmark case the government was not withholding information to protect national security but to cover up government mistakes. United States v. Reynolds established the government state secret privilege. After a 1948 Air Force plane crash killed several people, some relatives sought additional information on the crash. The government argued all the way to the Supreme Court that the accident reports could not be released, even to the court justices, for national security reasons. However the unsealed documents now reveal that the accident resulted from poor maintenance and inadequate training. The accident reports contained no security secrets. The case serves as a sobering reminder that the courts must carefully limit the government's use of secrecy.