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Avoiding potential jail time, a Time magazine reporter has given a statement to prosecutors investigating the Bush administration leak of a covert CIA officer's identity.
In a statement Tuesday, Time said reporter Matthew Cooper agreed to give a deposition after Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, personally released Cooper from a promise of confidentiality about a conversation the two had last year.
Cooper was held in civil contempt earlier this month by U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan for refusing to testify in the leak probe. Hogan rejected Time's claims, as well as those of "Meet the Press" host Tim Russert, that the First Amendment protected them from having to testify.
Cooper had faced up to 18 months in jail and the magazine could have been forced to pay $1,000 a day under the contempt order, which has now been vacated. Russert avoided the contempt citation by agreeing earlier to an interview with prosecutors, again after Libby released him from a confidentiality promise.
Cooper gave his deposition Monday to the special prosecutor appointed in the case, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago, in the Washington office of his lawyer, Floyd Abrams, the magazine statement said. The deposition focused on a single July 2003 conversation between Cooper and Libby about the leak, the statement said.
Investigators are trying to find out who in the Bush administration leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame, whose name was published by syndicated columnist Robert Novak on July 14, 2003. Novak cited two "senior administration officials" as his sources. It can be a felony to leak the name of an undercover officer.
The column came out about a week after Plame's husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, was critical in a newspaper opinion piece about President Bush's claim in his 2003 State of the Union address that Iraq sought to obtain uranium in Niger. The CIA had sent Wilson to Niger to investigate that claim, which he concluded was unfounded.
Glenn Kessler, a Washington Post reporter, also agreed to an interview in June after Libby agreed to release him from a similar promise.
Libby has been the focus of several subpoenas issued by prosecutors to journalists, but both Kessler and Russert said he did not provide Plame's name to them. Novak has repeatedly refused to say publicly who leaked the name to him and has not said whether he has received a subpoena.
Two other journalists ? Judith Miller of The New York Times and Walter Pincus of The Post ? have received subpoenas to testify in the case.
In a separate case, five reporters, including H. Josef Hebert of The Associated Press, were found in contempt last week for refusing to reveal their sources for stories about nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee. Lee is seeking the sources as part of his lawsuit against government agencies he says suggested he was a suspect in an investigation into possible theft of secrets from Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.
A $500-per-day fine was suspended pending appeals.
Nice job by Justice Department! Too bad Novak's seems off the hook. He really seems to be just a nasty guy and deserves some of the heat.
Avoiding potential jail time, a Time magazine reporter has given a statement to prosecutors investigating the Bush administration leak of a covert CIA officer's identity.
In a statement Tuesday, Time said reporter Matthew Cooper agreed to give a deposition after Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, personally released Cooper from a promise of confidentiality about a conversation the two had last year.
Cooper was held in civil contempt earlier this month by U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan for refusing to testify in the leak probe. Hogan rejected Time's claims, as well as those of "Meet the Press" host Tim Russert, that the First Amendment protected them from having to testify.
Cooper had faced up to 18 months in jail and the magazine could have been forced to pay $1,000 a day under the contempt order, which has now been vacated. Russert avoided the contempt citation by agreeing earlier to an interview with prosecutors, again after Libby released him from a confidentiality promise.
Cooper gave his deposition Monday to the special prosecutor appointed in the case, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago, in the Washington office of his lawyer, Floyd Abrams, the magazine statement said. The deposition focused on a single July 2003 conversation between Cooper and Libby about the leak, the statement said.
Investigators are trying to find out who in the Bush administration leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame, whose name was published by syndicated columnist Robert Novak on July 14, 2003. Novak cited two "senior administration officials" as his sources. It can be a felony to leak the name of an undercover officer.
The column came out about a week after Plame's husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, was critical in a newspaper opinion piece about President Bush's claim in his 2003 State of the Union address that Iraq sought to obtain uranium in Niger. The CIA had sent Wilson to Niger to investigate that claim, which he concluded was unfounded.
Glenn Kessler, a Washington Post reporter, also agreed to an interview in June after Libby agreed to release him from a similar promise.
Libby has been the focus of several subpoenas issued by prosecutors to journalists, but both Kessler and Russert said he did not provide Plame's name to them. Novak has repeatedly refused to say publicly who leaked the name to him and has not said whether he has received a subpoena.
Two other journalists ? Judith Miller of The New York Times and Walter Pincus of The Post ? have received subpoenas to testify in the case.
In a separate case, five reporters, including H. Josef Hebert of The Associated Press, were found in contempt last week for refusing to reveal their sources for stories about nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee. Lee is seeking the sources as part of his lawsuit against government agencies he says suggested he was a suspect in an investigation into possible theft of secrets from Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.
A $500-per-day fine was suspended pending appeals.
Nice job by Justice Department! Too bad Novak's seems off the hook. He really seems to be just a nasty guy and deserves some of the heat.
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