Philadelphia Inquirer, Sept. 30

Reporter, jailed for 3 months, is freed
Judith Miller refused to name a source in the CIA probe. With the source's OK, she will testify Sept. 30.

By John Shiffman and Steve Goldstein
Inquirer Staff Writers

Judith Miller, the New York Times reporter jailed since July 6 for refusing to identify a source, was released Sept. 29 and said she would appear before a grand jury Sept. 30.

"It's good to be free," said Miller, whose incarceration sparked a national debate on whether journalists should have the right to keep sources confidential.

Miller was jailed by a federal judge after she refused to testify before a grand jury investigating whether Bush administration officials leaked the name of a CIA covert officer, Valerie Plame.

Her surprise release came 10 days after Miller spoke by phone from jail with her source -- I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff.

During that conversation, Libby reaffirmed that he had released Miller from a promise of confidentiality more than a year ago, according to Libby's lawyer, Joseph A. Tate of Philadelphia. Libby had signed a blanket waiver, but Miller worried that senior Bush administration officials might have coerced it.

"She wanted to hear it directly from Mr. Libby," Tate said, "and he assured her that it was voluntary."

A 1982 federal law makes it a crime to disclose the name of American covert agents. Libby's lawyer has said he did nothing wrong.

Randall Samborn, a spokesman for Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in the case, would not comment.

Miller was released Sept. 29 at 3:55 p.m., according to officials at the Alexandria Detention Center in suburban Virginia. Her release, which was not announced publicly, was first reported by The Inquirer on its Web site at 6:40 p.m.

The controversy began in July 2003, when columnist Robert Novak, citing "two senior administration officials," named Plame as a CIA operative who worked on issues relating to weapons of mass destruction. The column criticized Plame's husband, retired diplomat Joseph Wilson, who had raised doubts on whether Iraq bought uranium for an atomic bomb.

Wilson has said he thinks Plame's name was leaked to discredit him. "If there was a crime committed, there was a crime committed against the national security of the country, not against me or Valerie," he said Sept. 29.

Wilson said he welcomed the news of Miller's release.

"Who wants to see a journalist in jail?" Wilson said.

Prosecutors have interviewed President Bush and Cheney, and the federal grand jury has taken testimony from senior White House aides, including Karl Rove and Libby.

Bush, while standing by Rove, said he would fire anyone in his administration who was found to have committed a crime.

Late last year, Fitzgerald asked the federal judge overseeing the grand jury, Thomas Hogan, to compel Miller and Time reporter Matt Cooper to reveal their sources. Cooper was spared incarceration after agreeing to testify at the last minute, saying Rove had given him a personal release to identify him as a source. Miller, however, remained steadfast.

"I went to jail to preserve the time-honored principle that a journalist must respect a promise not to reveal the identity of a confidential source," Miller said in a statement. "I chose to take the consequences -- 85 days in prison -- rather than violate that promise. The principle was more important to uphold than my personal freedom."

Miller won a Pulitzer Prize as part of a team reporting on al-Qaeda. She has also been criticized for her reporting on alleged weapons of mass destruction during the runup to the Iraq war.

In jail, where she worked in the laundry and campaigned for a federal shield law to protect journalists, Miller received many high-profile visitors, reportedly including former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw and U.N. Ambassador John R. Bolton.

Why Miller remained in jail for 12 weeks remained somewhat of a puzzle Sept. 29. According to Libby's lawyer, Libby never had a problem with Miller naming him as a source and had signed a general waiver to that effect a year ago.

"We were very surprised to learn this had anything to do with us and wish we had known this earlier, that it was her position that she wanted to talk to Libby directly," Tate said.

Tate said he was approached last month by Miller's lawyer, Robert Bennett, who wanted to know if Libby's waiver was genuine and uncoerced.

"He said, 'I'm just trying to check and make sure the waiver is voluntary because she doesn't believe it is,' " Tate recalled.

"I said, 'Bob, it is.' "

One complication: Lawyers in the case worried that if Libby and Miller talked about the case, they might be exposed to charges of obstructing the investigation.

Fitzgerald sent a letter to both sides that allayed those worries, clearing the way for a five-minute conversation last week between Libby and Miller, with their lawyers on the line.

Bennett did not return a phone call last night [Sept. 29].

The Times' publisher, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., said: "We are very pleased that she has finally received a direct and uncoerced waiver, both by phone and in writing, releasing her from any claim of confidentiality and enabling her to testify."

Tate said other journalists told the grand jury that Libby learned of the Plame-Wilson connection from other journalists. He expects Miller's testimony to be "consistent with what other journalists have said."

"He's very happy she's out," Tate said. "He expects that her testimony will be helpful to him."