Going Slowly with The 20th Hijacker

By Viveca Novak

Have prosecutors managed to get any information out of Zacarias Moussaoui, the accused "20th hijacker"? In the weeks since he was charged with conspiracy, it appears they have hardly tried. Sources close to the case tell TIME that federal prosecutors haven't pressured the alleged terrorist, who is now behind bars in Alexandria, Va., to find out what he knows about the Sept. 11 terror plot. Capital punishment is often used as a threat to extract information, but the government has not played that card since charging Moussaoui in December, the sources say. "They know there are others out there who were involved in planning the attacks and that they haven't solved this case," says a lawyer. "They should be talking to this guy." A Justice Department spokesman declined to comment. To be sure, there might be a public outcry if the government offered Moussaoui some kind of deal. But the government's strategy could change now that al-Qaeda operations boss Abu Zubaydah has been captured--if prosecutors believe Moussaoui has more to tell them.

Meanwhile, prosecutors have begun turning over mountains of discovery material to Moussaoui's lawyers. Among the items: 250 CD-ROMS containing items like a photo of gum wrappers, gathered from someplace Moussaoui had been; an 80-gigabyte hard drive from the University of Oklahoma (Moussaoui sometimes sent e-mails from computers there, but rather than just his e-mails, the entire student-union hard drive was delivered), and 13 hard drives from other locations. It's just a fraction of what defense lawyers will have to sift through by the time the trial starts next fall.

--By Viveca Novak