INVASION AFTERMATH: THE VICTIMS : Top-Secret Files Sought in Case of Noriega Pilot : Drug trials: The request for records is likely to be the first of many for the defendants.

An attorney for a co-defendant of deposed strongman Manuel A. Noriega said Tuesday he is asking for top-secret records of the National Security Agency on grounds that the agency “regularly monitored” all communications of Noriega’s Panama Defense Forces.

In the first federal court papers seeking U.S. intelligence files in the Noriega case, defense lawyer Michael J. O’Kane acted on behalf of Daniel Miranda, a pilot accused of flying $800,000 in drug profits to Noriega in Panama from the United States.

Meanwhile, U.S. Attorney Dexter Lehtinen said at a court hearing Tuesday that the government would like to move Noriega from his present basement courthouse cell to a more secure location some distance from Miami.

But U.S. District Judge William M. Hoeveler barred such a move for the foreseeable future, saying he does not want to impede Noriega’s ability to confer with his Miami lawyers.

The judge said the government must notify the court in advance of any plans to move Noriega so he can schedule a private court hearing on the proposal. Until such notice is given, Noriega must remain in detention in downtown Miami, Hoeveler said.

The former strongman, toppled from power when U.S. forces invaded Panama on Dec. 20, attended the court hearing dressed in a blue shirt and gray trousers. He sat calmly between his attorneys and listened to a Spanish translation of the proceedings through headphones.

Strategy Seen

O’Kane’s request for the National Security Agency records is likely to be the first of many such efforts by attorneys for Noriega or his co-defendants to gain access to sensitive intelligence documents that government officials would prefer to keep under wraps.

O’Kane said in an interview that he believes the NSA’s electronic eavesdropping picked up radio or telephone communication involving the 1983 flight from Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., to Panama City on which Miranda was the co-pilot and Eduardo Pardo, another co-defendant, the pilot.

“I want to discover if Gen. Noriega was contacted about this particular flight and if they discussed whether Miranda . . . knew what was being delivered,” O’Kane said. “Intercepted communications might show that Miranda knew nothing about the mission.”

O’Kane said that “it is likely there were other conversations intercepted by the NSA that would be relative to the case.”

His NSA record request, filed late Monday, covers not only conversations involving Miranda but any other defendant or individual named in the 1988 indictment returned by a grand jury in Miami against Noriega and 15 others on drug trafficking charges.

O’Kane did not disclose the basis for his belief that the NSA, a Defense Department agency characterized by some as the most secret operation in the U.S. government, had conducted widespread eavesdropping in Panama. But the defense attorney served for five years in the Canal Zone as a U.S. lawyer assigned to the Panama Canal Commission.

At a court hearing Tuesday, Lehtinen said O’Kane’s papers should have been filed under seal because they dealt with a question of national security.