client PC desktop files recovery server 2003

We have a server running SBS 2003 and it suffered a sudden catastrophic hard drive failure from which no files can be recovered.
Fortunately a backup of all the user folders is taken each day which is fortunate.
A new hard drive has been installed and SBS 2003 freshly installed to it.
Users are continuing to use their PC's in "offline mode" and they have a variety of shortcuts, links files and even folders on their local desktop.
Problem is, if we attempt to re-connect them to the domain then a fresh desktop is installed (active directory was not backed up) and all items are lost.
We thus thought we could copy all desktop items to the local drive, connect each user back to the domain and copy the items back to the desktop from each individual local drive.!
Unfortunately we get "permission errors" and Windows does not allow us to copy the files back once logged into the domain.
Any ideas how we can circumvent these "permission" restrictions.

thanks in advance for any feedback or suggestion.