See Woman Accused in Rendition Case Sues for Immunity,
by Scott Shane for the New York Times, May 14

A former American official charged with kidnapping in Italy in the 2003 seizure of a radical Muslim cleric filed a lawsuit on Wednesday seeking to force the State Department to invoke diplomatic immunity to halt the prosecution.

The Italians say Sabrina De Sousa is CIA, and was involved in the Feb. 2003 rendition of Abu Omar and want to prosecute her for it. She says she's not CIA and wasn't involved, swears she was a diplomat and is willing to sue in U.S. district court over it.  Scott Shane apparently found some "former agency officials" who told him that she had worked for the CIA.

Ms. De Sousa is suing the State Department because

"The government sent me to Italy to represent this country and then basically abandoned me." Ms. De Sousa called it "inexplicable" that the government had not invoked diplomatic immunity. "I'm still at a loss as to why this country is allowing the case to head toward conviction," she said.

Then there's this fishy response Shane got:

State Department officials declined to comment, noting that the case is at a highly sensitive stage. In March, Italy's Constitutional Court ruled that Italian prosecutors had violated state secrecy in gathering evidence in the case, and it is uncertain whether the prosecution will continue.

But the State Department officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, that they had been very active and "are pursuing every avenue to try to bring this case to a satisfactory resolution." They noted that most of the alleged officers charged in the rendition were not under diplomatic cover and would not qualify for immunity.

Legal experts said that intelligence officers serving under diplomatic cover often claim immunity when facing criminal charges overseas. But Curtis A. Bradley, a Duke law professor specializing in international law, cautioned that "consular immunity," the category that presumably would apply to Ms. De Sousa, was limited by treaty to "acts performed in the exercise of consular functions."

If she is CIA, is she angry about being made to take a fall for someone? If she's not, are they using her as a sacrificial lamb? The State Dept. anonymouse statement that the case is "at a highly sensitive stage" certainly suggests something or someone is being protected. I imagine they are not happy at the prospect of the American judicial system now being involved.  Maybe just dirty laundry could be exposed, maybe something much bigger?

I am going to try to follow the news updates in comments on this thread if I have time--participation by others welcome.