Posted on 08/24/2004 7:03:33 PM PDT by ambrose
Matthew Cooper Off the Hook, Gives Deposition in Plame Probe
By E&P Staff
Published: August 24, 2004
NEW YORK Matthew Cooper has skirted the threat of jail by agreeing to be interviewed Monday by Justice Department prosecutors investigating whether White House officials illegally leaked the identity of a covert CIA operative Valerie Plame.
Time magazine said in a statement today that Cooper agreed to give a deposition "because the one source the special counsel asked about," Lewis I. "Scooter" Libby, chief of staff for Vice President Dick Cheney, had waived a confidentially agreement he had with the reporter.
Libby also has agreed to allow the magazine to disclose its agreement with him.
"The deposition, which took place yesterday in the Washington, D.C., office of Mr. Cooper's attorney, Floyd Abrams, focused entirely on conversations Mr. Cooper had with Mr. Libby, one of Mr. Cooper's sources for the articles he helped author about the leak in July 2003," the Time statement said. "Following the deposition, the contempt orders against both Time Inc. and Mr. Cooper were vacated."
An order relesed today, but signed yesterday by U.S. District Chief Judge Thomas F. Hogan, cleared Cooper of the civil contempt citation the judge had issued two weeks ago.
Cooper had faced up to 18 months in jail and the magazine could have been forced to pay $1,000 a day under the contempt order, which has now been vacated.
Investigators are trying to find out who in the Bush administration leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame, whose name was published by syndicated columnist Robert Novak on July 14, 2003. Novak cited two "senior administration officials" as his sources. It can be a felony to leak the name of an undercover officer.
The column came out about a week after Plame's husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, was critical in a newspaper opinion piece about President Bush's claim in his 2003 State of the Union address that Iraq sought to obtain uranium in Niger. The CIA had sent Wilson to Niger to investigate that claim, which he concluded was unfounded.
Glenn Kessler, a Washington Post reporter, also agreed to an interview in June after Libby agreed to release him from a similar promise.
haha
Thank you. I certainly didn't get that from the article. It's as if its author intentionally tried to use complicated and twisty language to report the information. (Or perhaps my brain is not functioning properly tonight.)
Well, the media has one way they want to tell the story.
Pesky facts keep getting in the way.
Just like all of their other "Get Bush" attempts.
Please don't get agita over anything that that mouse Matthews has to say. He's just a liberal Democrat turd floating around in the MSNBC toilet. Forget about him. And whatever you do, never tune in his show. I gave up on Matthews several years ago and trust me, I do not miss him a bit. For me, he no longer exists.
Regards,
LH
Cooper is a shameless liar and a scumbag and I have no doubt that he lied. It's what he does - - as a Democrat activist it's what he IS. Of course, a lot of Democrats these days, when they're not sure if a tape exists, get a little nervous about their lying and instead resort to the trusty old, "I don't recall."
Thank you for your wise advice. I think I'll take it.
:)
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