By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 7, 2006; A06

FBI fingerprint examiners were reluctant to admit that they had mistakenly linked an Oregon lawyer to the 2004 Madrid train bombings in part because he was a Muslim convert and had represented a terrorism defendant in court, according to a report released yesterday by the Justice Department's inspector general.

The 20-page summary report by Inspector General Glenn A. Fine said that Brandon Mayfield's religion "was not the sole or primary cause" of the FBI Laboratory's mistaken identification of him, but it contributed to the bureau's reluctance to reexamine conclusions in the case.

Several FBI and Justice Department officials acknowledged that "Mayfield's religion was a factor in the investigation," the report said, in part because officials expected that any suspect in the bombings was likely to be Muslim.

"One of the examiners candidly admitted that if the person identified had been someone without those characteristics, like the 'Maytag Repairman,' the Laboratory might have revisited the identification with more skepticism and caught the error," the report said.

The report also identified "troubling" wording in government affidavits submitted in federal court, "which apparently led the judge to believe that the [Spanish National Police] had agreed with the FBI's fingerprint identification." In fact, Spanish investigators had concluded from the beginning that the fingerprint did not belong to Mayfield, despite concerted attempts by the FBI to persuade them otherwise.

Fine's report is the latest critical assessment of the FBI's treatment of Mayfield, who was arrested in May 2004 as a material witness and released two weeks later. He has since filed a lawsuit alleging, among other things, that the FBI targeted him because of his Muslim beliefs.

One of Mayfield's attorneys, Gerry Spence, said in a news release yesterday that Fine's report shows "the FBI acted with gross negligence" in targeting and arresting his client, and misled the federal courts in doing so.

"Rather than admit its mistake, because of Mr. Mayfield's Muslim faith, the U.S. government was willing to subject Mr. Mayfield to the death penalty," Spence said, referring to the possible punishment for serious terrorism crimes.

Mayfield was quoted in the statement as saying that the report confirms he was "the victim of religious profiling."

The FBI disagreed, emphasizing that Fine had concluded that Mayfield's Muslim faith was not a factor in the initial identification of him by fingerprint examiners. The bureau said Mayfield's arrest "was based on an extremely unusual confluence of events," primarily the remarkable similarity between his fingerprints from military service and the latent print found in Spain, which was eventually matched to an Algerian national, Ouhnane Daoud.

The FBI said it has implemented a number of reforms to ensure that such a mistake does not occur again.

In a separate probe, the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility concluded last month that federal prosecutors had "acted appropriately, professionally and ethically" in the case, according to a statement from U.S. Attorney Karin J. Immergut in Portland, Ore. The Justice Department declined to release further details of the OPR probe.

The document released yesterday was only the executive summary of a 273-page report by Fine that is still classified. Fine's office said it is negotiating with the Justice Department to have the entire document released publicly as soon as possible.

On March 11, 2004, terrorists later linked to al Qaeda detonated bombs on several commuter trains in Madrid, killing 191 people. The FBI assisted Spanish police by comparing latent prints found on a bag of detonators nearby against its massive fingerprint database, which includes prints from former U.S. soldiers.

On March 19, the FBI lab identified 20 possible matches for one of the prints; two examiners and a unit chief narrowed the match down to Mayfield. Spanish police conducted their own fingerprint analysis and informed the FBI on April 13, 2004, that its result was negative for Mayfield. The FBI disputed that finding, even dispatching an examiner to Madrid to press its case.

Fine's report concludes that FBI examiners made a number of errors, including using "circular reasoning" to firm up their conclusion and ignoring rules that an identification must be ruled out if there is an unexplained discrepancy between the prints.

FBI examiners had no way of knowing Mayfield's religion or occupation when they first identified him as a suspect, Fine's report said, but those factors likely influenced their conclusions in the weeks that followed.

Mayfield's attorneys have also criticized the FBI and Justice Department for allegedly misusing the USA Patriot Act in conducting surveillance and secret searches of Mayfield's home and office.

But Fine concluded that investigators would probably have been able to receive court authorization for such activity even without the Patriot Act, which loosened restrictions on the FBI.