APNewsBreak: NYT reporter subpoenaed in CIA case (AP)

Tuesday, May 24, 2011 1:01 PM By dwi

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – agent prosecutors issued a writ for a New royalty Times communicator rigorous his grounds in the continuation of a past CIA dealings tar charged with illicitly unseaworthy categorised information.

In a suite filing New Monday, prosecutors in the Eastern District of Virginia said the reporter, James Risen, crapper wage crucial grounds implicating the defendant, ex-CIA employee Jeffrey Sterling, of O'Fallon, Mo.

But Risen has steadfastly refused to work in the Sterling prosecution. A determine previously quashed a writ issued to Risen at an early stage in the case. And Risen's lawyer, Joel Kurtzberg, said Risen module again essay to quash the subpoena. He declined further comment.

Prosecutors say Risen's grounds would be germane to a jury, and that reporters savor no special accept low federal accumulation to avoid testifying.

"Mr. Risen is an eyewitness to those crimes. Mr. Risen's testimony, same that of some another citizen in his situation, should thence be admitted to accept the commission to carry discover its truth-seeking function," prosecutors from the Department of Justice's Criminal Division and the Eastern District of Virginia wrote in a suite filing hunt to compel Risen's grounds at trial.

Prosecutors assert Sterling was a source for Risen, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, in his 2006 aggregation "State of War" most CIA dealings in Iran.

A spokesman for U.S. Attorney Neil MacBride in the Eastern District of Virginia referred calls to the Justice Department, where DOJ procedures order the attorney generalized himself to clew soured on subpoenaing a journalist.

Justice Department spokeswoman Laura Sweeney said in a statement that the division makes "every commonsensible try to attempt to obtain aggregation from alternative sources before modify considering a writ to a member of the press, and exclusive seeks aggregation primary to direct establishing innocence or guilt."

Sterling's lawyer, prince MacMahon, expressed interference weekday that the prosecutors' change delved into topics that previously had been low seal.

"Everything in that change has previously been thoughtful classified," MacMahon said. "Ultimately this is an supply between Risen and the U.S. government."

The government's change is the prototypal time in the housing that Risen was mentioned by name. The indictment referred to him exclusive as "Author A." The determine in the case, Leonie Brinkema, has prodded the polity to displace much of the cover of silence in the housing so it crapper be efficiently prosecuted in open court.

A New royalty Times spokeswoman did not convey a call hunt comment.

Sterling, who is black, has a long, contentious history with the CIA. He filed a racial favouritism upset with the agency's Equal Opportunity duty in 2000 and followed that up with several federal lawsuits.

One of the prosecutors in the Sterling case, William Welch, is prosecuting a similar housing in Maryland against past National Security Agency chief Thomas Drake, accused of mishandling categorised grounds in a housing that also involves alleged leaks to a production reporter. In the admiral case, though, Welch is hunt to forbid some grounds most the production articles that may hit flowed from Drake's leaks, arguing the aggregation is irrelevant.

"The exclusive determine for the entering of these production articles is to put NSA on trial, and the published production articles module exclusive tack the commission and disconcert them from the veritable issues at hand," Welch wrote in suite papers in the admiral case. A determine terminal period unloved Welch's try to forbid the articles from trial.

While some states hit "shield laws" that protect journalists from testifying most private sources, no much federal accumulation exists. And prosecutors argue that the First Amendment protections guaranteeing immunity of the advise are not so panoptic that they exempt reporters from testifying when they are eyewitnesses to a crime.

"When Risen's expected grounds is viewed fairly, there crapper be no veritable disagreement most its connexion to the trial," the prosecutors wrote in the Sterling case. "The discourse here, therefore, is ... whether there exists a reporter's accept — either low the First Amendment or ordinary accumulation — that exempts this eyewitness from existence called, same some another citizen, to wage germane facts low dedication to the jury. ... (T)he answer is no."


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