Jail Next Stop For 2 Journalists?

High Court Ruling Could Put Time's Cooper, NYT's Miller Behind Bars

(AP)  Every state but Wyoming recognizes reporters' rights to protect their confidential sources of information, justices were told in a brief filed on behalf of 34 states, and without those privileges "reporters in those states would find their newsgathering abilities compromised, and citizens would find themselves far less able to make informed political, social and economic choices."

But Fitzgerald said in his own filing that the federal government is different. "Local jurisdictions do not have responsibility for investigating crimes implicating national security, and reason and experience strongly counsel against adoption of an absolute reporter's privilege in the federal courts," he said.

"That 49 states and many countries around the globe provide broad protection for journalists who have promised confidentiality to their sources, makes today's decision even more disappointing," said Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr., publisher of The New York Times.

In the last journalist source case at the Supreme Court, the 1972 Branzburg v. Hayes, a divided court ruled against a Louisville, Ky., reporter who had written a story about drug trafficking and was called to testify about it. Justices said that requiring journalists to reveal information to grand juries served a "compelling" state interest and did not violate the First Amendment.

That decision has been interpreted differently and clarification is needed because dozens of reporters around the country have been subpoenaed over the past two years, said Washington lawyer Miguel Estrada, representing Time magazine.

Still pending before a federal appeals court is a contempt ruling against five journalists — including Associated Press reporter H. Josef Hebert — who have refused to identify their sources for stories on Wen Ho Lee, the nuclear scientist whose career was cut short when his name surfaced as an espionage suspect.

Lee is suing the government for leaking his name to the news media during a political frenzy late in the Clinton administration when Republicans accused the White House of ignoring China's alleged theft of U.S. nuclear secrets. The other journalists include Los Angeles Times reporter Robert Drogin, James Risen and Jeff Gerth of The New York Times, and Pierre Thomas, formerly of CNN and now of ABC.