Libby was "set up" to protect Rove-lawyer

WASHINGTON, Jan 23 (Reuters) The former vice presidential aide charged with perjury was ''set up'' by the White House to protect political strategist Karl Rove during a CIA leak investigation, his lawyer said today.

Lewis ''Scooter'' Libby was so worried that he would be blamed for blowing the cover of a CIA operative that he asked his boss, Vice President Dick Cheney, to intervene on his behalf, defense lawyer Theodore Wells told the jury at the beginning of Libby's perjury trial.

''He was concerned about being set up,'' Wells said. ''He was concerned about being the scapegoat for this entire Valerie Wilson controversy.'' Libby resigned as Cheney's chief of staff when he was charged with lying to investigators who sought to determine who leaked CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity. The leak occurred after Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, accused the Bush administration of manipulating intelligence to build its case for invading Iraq.

Special Prosector Patrick Fitzgerald said Libby told investigators he only passed along rumors about the operative, who was known by her maiden name, to reporters.

But Fitzgerald told the jury that Libby had actually sought out information from other government officials, and then shared that information with reporters as fact.

''The defendant lied to the FBI and stole the truth from the grand jury,'' Fitzgerald said in his opening statement.

Wells has indicated he plans to argue that Libby couldn't possibly remember the details of conversations he had about Plame months after they happened because he was preoccupied with national security matters.

But in his opening statement, Wells made clear he also intends to point a finger at the White House and the CIA.

Wells displayed a note written by Cheney that said he was ''not going to protect one staffer (and) sacrifice the guy that was asked to stick his neck in the meat grinder because of the incompetence of others.'' Wells said the staffer referred to is Rove, the man who is given credit for directing President George W. Bush's two successful presidential campaigns.

Libby ''was an important staffer, but Karl Rove was the lifeblood of the Republican Party,'' Wells said.

Cheney is among the prominent government officials and journalists expected to testify in the six-week case, which will examine the White House and the Washington press corps as the nation went to war in Iraq in 2003.

Nobody has been charged with blowing Plame's cover, though former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage has admitted that he leaked her identity to reporters.

Rove also discussed Plame's identity with reporters before it was publicly known. He faced prolonged scrutiny in the case before he was cleared by Fitzgerald last June.

REUTERS PDS RN0122