Two of the companies, Richmor Aviation Inc. and Premier Executive Transport Services Inc., chartered luxury Gulfstreams that flew terror suspects captured in Europe to Egypt, according to US and European media reports. Once there, they were tortured, the men told relatives. Authorities in Italy and Sweden have expressed outrage over flights they say were illegal and orchestrated by the US government.
The Gulfstreams faced scrutiny in 2001, but what hasn't been disclosed is the Navy's role in contracting planes involved in operations the CIA terms ''rendition" and what Italian prosecutors call kidnapping.
''A lot of us have been focusing on the role of the CIA, but also suspecting that certain parts of the armed forces are involved," said Margaret Satterthwaite, a New York University School of Law researcher who has investigated renditions.
The Navy contracts involve more planes than previously reported -- other news outlets said there were 26 planes; the AP identified 33.
Italian judges have issued arrest warrants for 19 purported CIA operatives who allegedly snatched a Muslim cleric from Milan in 2003 and flew him to Cairo aboard Richmor's Gulfstream IV, according to FAA records cited by the Chicago Tribune. The jet belongs to a part-owner of the Boston Red Sox, who told The Boston Globe that the team's logo was covered when the CIA leased the plane. Another case involves two men taken from Sweden to Egypt in 2001 aboard Premier's Gulfstream V.
Neither the CIA nor a Navy spokeswoman at the Pentagon would comment for this story. Officials at the Navy Engineering Logistics Office in Arlington, Va., did not respond to messages requesting comment.
Joseph P. Duenas, counsel for the logistics office, declined to provide the contracts, saying they ''involve national security information that is classified."
The secrecy surrounding the contracts makes it unclear why the logistics office issued them, but one reason may be the office's anonymity -- some career Navy officials have never heard of it.
