These officials took the CIA to task in the 1970s for illegal spying. Now they want another investigation.

A team of former congressional investigators is calling for a new inquiry into the Central Intelligence Agency -- not unlike one they performed nearly four decades ago.

The officials -- who helped lead a months-long study in 1975 to assess allegations that the CIA had improperly spied on US citizens -- say Congress should convene a special panel to determine whether America's intelligence agencies have overstepped their bounds.

In a letter sent to the White House and top lawmakers, the officials drew parallels between recent allegations of overreach and their work on the Church committee, the investigative body chaired by the late Sen. Frank Church (D-IH) that resulted in a two-feet-thick report on the intelligence community's secret activities.

"There is a crisis of public confidence," they wrote. "Misleading statements by agency officials to Congress, the courts, and the public have undermined public trust in the intelligence community and in the capacity for the branches of government to provide meaningful oversight." Among those who signed the letter are the Church committee's chief counsel, Frederick AO Schwartz; top committee staffer and University of Georgia professor Loch Johnson; and more than a dozen others.