Series Focuses on Need for Confidential Sources

April 05, 2006

The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) and the MLRC Institute, a non-profit educational organization focused on the media and the First Amendment, have begun co-sponsoring a series of talks by reporters and media lawyers to explain the importance of confidential sources in uncovering news stories. Some of the nation's leading investigative reporters are appearing at bookstores across the county to discuss the dangerous increase in efforts to force journalists to reveal their sources.

"We are really pleased with what we are hearing from the stores," said Chris Finan, ABFFE president. "The reporters have been fascinating, and customers have been thanking the booksellers for educating them about an important First Amendment issue." More than 50 bookstores have volunteered to host reporters, and to date a dozen reporters have been confirmed to speak in cities across the country, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, Minneapolis, Albuquerque, and Salt Lake City.

The series began in February with appearances by San Francisco Chronicle reporters Seth Rosenfield and Mark Fainaru-Wada each at an independent bookstore in California. Rosenfield, who has used confidential sources in many investigations, including one that revealed an FBI campaign to discredit the president of the University of California during the Cold War, appeared at Pegasus Books in Berkeley on February 16. Fainaru-Wada, who has gained national recognition as the co-author of Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal That Rocked Professional Sports (Gotham), spoke at Readers' Books in Sonoma, California, on the 21st.

On March 18, That Bookstore in Blytheville in Arkansas hosted an appearance by Deborah Mathis, a former White House correspondent for the Gannett News Service, who now teaches at Northwestern University. That Bookstore's Mary Gay Shipley said, "It was wonderful to have the opportunity ... to educate the public about what's going on and to have Deborah appear." She noted that, among other things, Mathis discussed how difficult it is to get information from the current administration.

An event at Books & Books in Miami on April 4 featured Susan Candiotti, a national correspondent for CNN, and Jim DeFede, a reporter and commentator for CBS' Miami affiliate, WFOR-TV. DeFede formerly covered politics for the Miami Herald. And later this month, Linda Deutsch, chief legal correspondent for the Associated Press, is scheduled to speak at Skylight Books in Los Angeles. Deutsch has reported on many of the most famous trials over the last 40 years. She also covered three presidents and the fall of Saigon. She will be at Skylight on April 20.

Although prosecutors and journalists have long battled over confidential sources, ABFFE notes that there has been a large increase in the number of subpoenas issued to reporters in recent years. In one such case, New York Times reporter Judith Miller went to jail for 85 days before her source, I. Lewis Libby, released her from a confidentiality agreement covering conversations about Valerie Plame, a CIA officer.

A new confrontation between the government and the Times may be brewing as the FBI is currently seeking to identify the person who told reporters Eric Lichtblau and James Risen that the National Security Agency is conducting warrantless wiretaps of American citizens.

Other recent subpoena cases noted by ABFFE include a Rhode Island television reporter who was sentenced to six months of house arrest for refusing to reveal a confidential source in a story on municipal corruption, and six reporters who were subpoenaed in a lawsuit filed against the government by Wen Ho Lee. The nuclear scientist was named by the press as someone who may have passed secrets to China.

Topics: News - Bookselling, Free Expression,