NYT-Contempt Finding Is Lifted in Case of Times Reporter

Contempt Finding Is Lifted in Case of Times Reporter


By DAVID JOHNSTON
Published: October 13, 2005

WASHINGTON, Oct. 12 - A federal district judge here lifted a contempt order Wednesday against Judith Miller, a reporter for The New York Times, after she testified before a grand jury investigating the C.I.A. leak case about recently discovered notes relating to a conversation she had with a senior White House official.

The judge, Thomas F. Hogan, lifted the contempt finding several hours after Ms. Miller testified about the notes, which she took during a discussion on June 23, 2003, with I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff.

"We are thrilled and delighted," Robert S. Bennett, a lawyer for Ms. Miller, said of Judge Hogan's action, "and Judy is moving on to be the great, principled reporter that she is."

Bill Keller, The Times's executive editor, said: "It's a great relief to have Judy out of legal jeopardy. And it should clear the way for The Times to do what we've been yearning to do: tell the story." Mr. Keller had said in an earlier message to the paper's staff that once Ms. Miller's "obligations to the grand jury are fulfilled, we intend to write the most thorough story we can of her entanglement with the White House leak investigation."

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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/13/national/13leak.html

Which should be next week.

If this ain't a load of horseshit...then what is.:puke: :puke: :puke: :puke: :puke:

Editor/publisher have to be seriously deluded or need to switch meds or something. Any real reporters there must be cringing and disgusted.

What credibility can the NYT have after slavishly slobbering over the reporter who most notably damaged its credibilty and objectivity in regards to Iraq and the Administration?

Forget credibility, their fantasy cartoon of Judy Miller, "great, principled reporter" is just fucking laughable. Pathetic that they have to engage in such puffery since her work doesn't stand up on its own except as a cautionary example to journo students.

I'm not sure I like this. It means they're not going after her, and wasn't she complicit in this whole deception? Seems like they're letting her off the hook completely, and I thought she was involved as well.

...but Miller is far from being in the clear.

Remember, the NYT has a vested interest in making themselves look like the good guys.

So this does not release her from being indicted?

That's a first step. But the median of the news reports basically say she gave Libby up, volunteering reporter's notes about an earlier meeting Libby never mentioned in all his interviews/testimony. If that's what she did, she may skate, but her journalistic principles are a joke.

.....which was brought on by her refusal to testify. Releasing the contempt citation does not even speak to the issue of her complicity in any possible criminal acts being investigated. It merely is a reflection of the fact that she had finally complied by testifying, and thus the reason for the contempt citation no longer is in play.

She can still be indicted, just not for criminal contempt. But again, relative to her possible criminal acts, the contempt of court issue and the issue of indictments for the actual crimes are separate issues.

Edit: added the word "of".

She was ordered by a judge to testify before the grand jury.

She refused.

So the judge found her in contempt of court; and she went to jail.

Then she said she'd testify. But until she testified, she was still in contempt of court.

She ultimately did testify, so the contempt order was lifted.

But she could still face indictment, depending on the evidence.

Hope this helps clear it up for you.

Buford Pusser

I do believe there may have been a threat somewhere.

Once there are more unknowns from the grand jury, then Keller will have to respond, as he said he will do (not personally but via reporters), but the ombudsman will also have to weigh in. He has a column every Sunday. That will be interesting.

b_b

Times Reporter Tells Grand Jury
About Talk With Top Cheney Aide

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB112913942726766844-3CCi3ToSECn3bo7lFjx4AtbDp_g_20061012.html?mod=blogs

The lifting of the order is significant, because it opens the door for Ms. Miller to disclose details of her story and her testimony to the Times, which has been criticized for not being more forthcoming on what it knows about its reporter's involvement in the case. Bill Keller, executive editor of the Times, said on Tuesday that once Ms. Miller's "obligations to the grand jury are fulfilled, we intend to write the most thorough story we can...."

...The investigation focuses on whether White House or other officials illegally leaked to reporters the identity of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson's wife, who was a Central Intelligence Agency covert operative, in an effort to undercut his credibility. Ultimately, Valerie Plame's name and identity were disclosed in a newspaper column, touching off the investigation...The disclosure of an earlier conversation between Mr. Libby and Ms. Miller in June 2003 is potentially significant, because it suggests the White House could have been developing a strategy to undermine Mr. Wilson even before he went public with his criticisms of the administration's Iraq policy in an op-ed in the Times on July 6, 2003, and in an appearance the same day on NBC's "Meet the Press."

But some Republicans are raising doubts about the depth of the troubles for the White House. Former Attorney General Edwin Meese said Wednesday that it could be difficult to prove that officials knowingly violated laws...."There's no indication that any of the people I know about recognized or knew anything confidential about this particular fact, so there appears to be a lack of intent," Mr. Meese said. My editorial comment--Yeah, sure, pal!!!)

While Ms. Miller's testimony is over, Karl Rove, the White House deputy chief of staff and senior adviser to the president, is expected to testify for a fourth time to the grand jury, most likely Thursday. It isn't clear if he will be asked to explain differences between his prior testimony and that of a Time magazine reporter, Matt Cooper, who testified in July that Mr. Rove was one of his sources for a story on Mr. Wilson.

hadn't seen it. Will be interesting to see what kind of spin Miller and the NYT try.

This clown is going with the same line that Victoria Toensing used yesterday on the Matthews show. The old, NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ALONG line!!!

Obviously, the hatchet cretins in the WH have sent out a fax to all their minions, telling them to push this meme: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/12/AR2005101202002.html

It won't work, but damn, they are getting really DESPERATE!!!!

to get to the only truth nugget in it: "I have no idea what Fitzgerald will do"

the rest is just :puke:

dp

"This is rarely considered a crime. In the Plame case, it might technically be one, but it was not the intent of anyone to out a CIA agent and have her assassinated (which happened once) but to assassinate the character of her husband. This is an entirely different thing. She got hit by a ricochet."

What a fucking idiotic gas bag. So, IOW, even though it's a crime, and A DAMN SERIOUS ONE (blowing the cover of an undercover CIA agent hunting WMD's, and also blowing the cover of Brewster Jennings and possibly even leading to DEATHS of agents and assetts), just forget about it, well, because, ummm, well because it sorta might kinda lead to stilling the tongues of leakers???? Actually you asshole, the real leaker/whistleblower was JOE WILSON and it was THE ADMIN who tried to still HIS tongue by illegally blowing the cover of his wife. How does this asshole know what the "intent" was of the leakers who blew her cover anyway? My loathing for the creep who wrote this knows no bounds.

Victoria Toensing, Mary Matalin, all of the GOP talking heads...but they are so fucking STOOOOOOOOPID that they are using the same damn catch phrases, and not even trying to make it appear that they have all come to the exact same conclusions, in the exact same order, independently. It's like they are out there playing defense because they have been ORDERED to so do, but they aren't even putting any heart and soul into the effort.

Into the valley of death, rode the Republicans!!!!

... what does "intent" have to do with it? A crime (usually) is still a crime whether there was "intent" or not. Good luck with that defense.

It means "on purpose," or "not accidentally." There is a thread around here somewhere making the point that the law in question is much easier to enforce than all the shills are making it out to be as they go whistling past the graveyard.

and anyone who claims it was is going to go down in flames.

"we intend to write the most thorough story we can of her entanglement with the White House leak investigation."

i.e. the most thorough story we are allowed to write.

http://www.cleveland.com/newsflash/washington/index.ssf?/base/politics-8/112921644133312.xml&storylist=washington

Order lifted against Miller in CIA probe
10/13/2005, 11:08 a.m. ET
By PETE YOST
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge in the CIA leak investigation lifted a contempt order against New York Times reporter Judith Miller, clearing the way for the newspaper to fulfill its promise to publish a full account of Miller's conversations with Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff.

In grand jury testimony, Miller has detailed three contacts she had with I. Lewis Libby in June and July 2003 about former U.S. ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife, covert CIA officer Valerie Plame.

Plame's identity was leaked to reporters by officials in the Bush administration, after a July 6, 2003 op-ed piece by Wilson publicly criticized the Bush administration. Wilson wrote that the administration had twisted intelligence on Iraq's nuclear weapons program to exaggerate the Iraqi threat. Miller never wrote a story on Wilson or his wife.

U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan lifted the contempt order following Miller's testimony to the grand jury Wednesday about a previously undisclosed June 23, 2003 conversation she had with Libby about Wilson...

If they showed Libby's guilt, Miller would not want to release them, don't you think?