Jan. Photos Said Used for Terror Alert

[DEMonstate]

WASHINGTON (AP) - Authorities have evidence that new surveillance photographs were taken of Prudential Financial's headquarters in Newark in January, a top homeland security official said Friday, even as President Bush defended the decision to issue terrorism warnings on the basis of old intelligence.

In the past, U.S. officials have said only that there was some evidence of new surveillance as late as January of this year.

But James Loy, the deputy secretary of homeland security and No. 2 official at the agency, told a reporter for The Associated Press, that new photographs were taken in January of the building's interior and exterior, and were not simply old photographs that had been altered or otherwise updated.

"Both inside and out," Loy told The Associated Press following a ceremony to confer badges on officers of the department's U.S. Customs and Border Protection Office.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20040806/D849UNT00.html