NEW YORK — A judge has told the government it will have to release some pictures of detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, civil rights lawyers said.

U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, finding the public has a right to see pictures of prisoner abuse, told the government yesterday he would sign an order requiring it to release some pictures to the American Civil Liberties Union to comply with the Freedom of Information Act, lawyers said.

The judge made the decision after viewing a sampling of nine pictures resulting from an Army probe of abuse and torture at the prison. The pictures were given to the Army by a military policeman assigned there.

ACLU lawyer Megan Lewis said she was encouraged after the judge viewed the sampling privately with government attorneys and decided some pictures could be released, while others must be redacted or were not relevant to the ACLU's request. She said the judge's findings likely would clear the way for the release of other pictures of detainees taken elsewhere around the world by U.S. authorities.

"I do think they could be extremely upsetting and depict conduct that would outrage the American public and be truly horrifying," Lewis said outside court.

The judge, who ordered the transcript of comments made during his viewing of the pictures sealed, did not disclose his findings in court but did say his order "will lead to production (of the pictures) or further proceedings."

"Further proceedings" presumably was a reference to possible appeals by government lawyers, who refused to comment as they left the court hearing.

Hellerstein looked at the photographs during an hourlong meeting in chambers after saying earlier in the day in open court that he believed the public should see pictures.

"I think," he said in the morning, "photographs present a different level of detail and are the best evidence the public can have of what occurred."

In October 2003, the ACLU filed a Freedom of Information Act request awsuit seeking information on treatment of detainees in U.S. custody and the transfer of prisoners to countries known to use torture. The ACLU contends in ACLU v. Department of Defense that prisoner abuse is systemic. That lawsuit was filed in June 2004 in response to inaction on the FOIA request.

So far, 36,000 pages of documents and the reports of 130 investigations, mostly from the FBI and Army, have been turned over to the ACLU. The group is seeking documents from the CIA and the Department of Defense as well.

The pictures Hellerstein viewed were different from the images of torture at Abu Ghraib prison that were leaked to the news media earlier this year.

Releasing the pictures would "allow members of the public to make their own determination as to what is happening in the photograph," Lewis said.

Government lawyer Sean Lane argued that releasing pictures, even in redacted form, would violate Geneva Convention rules on prisoner treatment by subjecting detainees to additional humiliation or embarrassment.

Lane said the emotional wounds would be reopened because detainees could identify themselves and because the public would learn identities even if faces and other features were blocked.

Still, the judge said, "I don't believe with suitable redaction there is an unwarranted invasion of privacy." He suggested that instances of identification would be sparse.