Our view: Federal shield law is long overdue

In 2005, Judith Miller, then a reporter for The New York Times, spent 85 days in jail for refusing to testify before a federal grand jury about the identity of the source who revealed Valerie Plame as an operative for the CIA.

Because the case was held in the federal courts, Miller faced a Hobson’s choice of violating the confidentiality she held with her source, or going to jail for contempt. There is no federal shield law that protects reporters and their confidential sources, although there are laws or legal precedents that provide that protection in 49 states and the District of Columbia. Nothing illustrates the vital need for such a federal law like a case involving a former reporter for USA TODAY.

Toni Locy wrote several stories on the 2002 anthrax scare, identifying U.S. Army scientist Steven Hatfill as “a person of interest” in the case. Locy gained the permission of two sources and revealed their identities in a federal civil action Hatfill has lodged against then-Attorney General John Ashcroft and others, but U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton has ordered her to identify all of her sources and let the court decide which are relevant. Walton’s order is troublingly high-handed.

The information sought can be readily provided by Ashcroft or other witnesses already available to the court, making Locy’s sources seemingly superfluous to the court case. However, Walton underscored his mandate to Locy with a stinging structure of fines that ups the ante significantly.

The fines against Locy begin at $500 per day and climb to $5,000 per day as time goes by. Worse, the judge ordered that Locy must pay the fines personally; neither USA TODAY nor anyone else can pay on her behalf. The fines have been set aside pending appeal. Judith Miller, who, coincidentally, received one of the first anthrax hoax letters, stood on principle by sitting in jail.

Toni Locy’s principles could cost her own financial ruin and, potentially, her freedom. This madness must end. Reporters and whistleblowers deserve a measure of protection for divulging information that lies clearly in the public interest.

The future of our republic rests in the protection of a free press. Last year, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee approved a measure that strikes a delicate balance between national security and the public’s right to know. However, the measure has not come up for a vote before the full Senate. The courts must take a more reasonable stance in Toni Locy’s case.

Meanwhile, the Senate must approve the Free Flow of Information Act to protect the Judith Millers and Toni Locys of the future.