Another Judge Tries To Ignore The First Amendment

Here we go… Another case where a federal judge is going to try and intimidate reporters so they reveal their sources.

A federal judge told two San Francisco Chronicle reporters they must comply with a subpoena and tell a grand jury who leaked them secret testimony of Barry Bonds and other elite athletes ensnared in the government's steroid probe.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White means reporters Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada must appear before a grand jury investigating the leak unless a higher court blocks the ruling. The pair have said they would not testify and would go to jail rather than reveal their source or sources.

The two reporters published a series of articles and a book based partly on transcripts of testimony by Bonds, Jason Giambi and others who testified in the grand jury investigation of the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative, a Burlingame-based nutritional supplement company exposed as a steroid ring that netted five convictions.

The criminal conduct being investigated in the Bonds leak case includes possible perjury and obstruction of justice by government officials, defendants in the BALCO probe and their attorneys. All have sworn they weren't the source of the leak.

The government told White that its investigation has turned up empty, and that Williams and Fainaru-Wada are the last hope of finding the culprit or culprits.

The government's last hope in this case is to violate the constitutional rights of two reporters? That's pretty sad.

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