Assault on Journalistic Freedom & 1st Amendment

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (Dec. 9) - A TV reporter was sentenced Thursday to six months of home confinement for refusing to say who leaked him an FBI videotape of a politician taking a bribe.

Jim Taricani, 55, could have gotten up to six months in federal prison. He was found guilty last month of criminal contempt for defying U.S. District Judge Ernest Torres' order to identify his source. The Taricani had argued that he had promised to protect his source's identity.

Taricani, who has a transplanted heart, had asked for less than 30 days of home confinement because of his health problems. Prosecutors asked for six months of confinement at home.

Taricani is one of several journalists nationwide who have become locked in First Amendment battles with the government over confidential sources. That includes reporters for Time and The New York Times who have been threatened with jail as part of an investigation into the disclosure of an undercover CIA officer's identity.

In the Providence case, the FBI tape of a former mayoral aide taking a $1,000 payoff was part of a corruption probe that ultimately sent city officials, including former Mayor Vincent "Buddy" Cianci, to federal prison.

Taricani broke no law by airing the tape, but attorneys, investigators and defendants were under court order not to disseminate any tapes connected to the probe, and a special prosecutor had been appointed to find out who leaked the tape.

After a three-year investigation failed to urn up the source, Torres found Taricani in civil contempt in and began fining him $1,000 a day to compel him to speak. Taricani refused, saying he had an obligation to his source, and ran up $85,000 in fines, paid for by his employer, NBC-affiliated WJR, before the judge turned up the pressure by charging him with criminal contempt.

The reporter called his Nov. 18 criminal contempt verdict an "assault on journalistic freedom."

https://tikicentral.com/newtopic.php?forum=6

[ Edited by: christiki295 on 2004-12-09 20:09 ]

This's nothing new, cases like this have been appearing for years, this one isn't getting much play outside of the local area (or at least isn't getting much play in San Diego).

Judges have great powers on the bench, they can fine or jail you without you having any recourse to apeal in the courts. If after 6 months Taricani still refuses to release the name the judge can imprison him again & again & again until the judge retires or is removed from the bench.

As much as some people would like, there is no legal protection afforded for reporters who refuse to reveal their sources.

There is no "reporter-leakee" privledge in US law.

I'm curious, can't he simply plead the fifth here?

I mean, you don't have to say aything if you do not wish to, right? Is it not your right to keep quiet about anything you want to keep quiet about?

This is just so shocking. I mean, I must be so monumentally naive.

Ahu

What! People not allowed the freedom of speech (or not to speak)!

(I have nothing else to say...)

Consider the perjury offense - you can be tossed in jail for lying under oath. One could just as easily (try to) say that's a violation of 1st amendment rights too, but it's not.

-Randy

Somebody should ask Robert Novak to clear this all up for us. He should know.
Tg

Ku Ku,
Fifth Amendment applies on self-incrimination. "No person...shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself". However, one can be compelled to be a witness against another.
Reporters from all parts of the political spectrum face this sticky wicket. What I found interesting in Novak's case was that the New York Times was more than happy to see him penalized until their own reporters ran afoul of the same issue on the same case.

JTD

JTD,

Thanks for the clarification. I suppose that I might have surmised that the fifth only covers potential self-incrimination, but what about instances where someone might be "compelled" to reveal information about people that could put them in danger?

Say, mob information and such.

I must admit though, my reply to this thread was just an excuse to slip in the "Big Trouble in Little China" quote.

Ku Ku

I move that we change the subject line of this thread to: "Journalistic Freedom & 1st Amendment... Reminiscing"
-FB