Criminal Contempt Could Lengthen Reporter's Jail Stay

Washington Post ^ | 07/16/05 | Howard Kurtz and Carol D. Leonnig

[Pikamax]

Criminal Contempt Could Lengthen Reporter's Jail Stay

By Howard Kurtz and Carol D. Leonnig Washington Post Staff Writers Saturday, July 16, 2005; A06

Lawyers in the CIA leaks investigation are concerned that special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald may seek criminal contempt charges against New York Times reporter Judith Miller, a rare move that could significantly lengthen her time in jail.

Miller, now in her 10th day in the Alexandria jail, already faces as much as four months of incarceration for civil contempt after refusing to answer questions before a grand jury about confidential conversations she had in reporting a story in the summer of 2003. Fitzgerald and Chief U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan have both raised the possibility in open court that Miller could be charged with criminal contempt if she continues to defy Hogan's order to cooperate in the investigation of who may have unlawfully leaked the name of undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame to the media.

[Grampa Dave]

"I doubt the extent of Miller's involvement is what she might have said to Libby 2 days before Novak's article."

"I suspect there's something earlier."

Like a fairly long relationship with the Plame/Wilson and probably Plames supervisor at the Farm, Foley, who suddenly resigned after we and others started confronting the Slimes Plame/game sham in 2003.