Journalist Ross of ABC Ordered To Disclose Sources

By JOSEPH GOLDSTEIN, Staff Reporter of the Sun
September 28, 2007

A federal judge in New York has ordered a journalist at ABC News, Brian Ross, to disclose the identities of the government sources he relied upon when reporting about the anthrax attacks of 2001.

Mr. Ross is now the sixth reporter to have been ordered to give up sources to assist with a civil lawsuit brought by a former Army scientist, Steven Hatfill, whom the government named as a "person of interest" in the investigation into the deadly anthrax mailings. Mr. Hatfill, who was never charged with the mailings, is suing the federal government for invading his privacy.

The ruling, signed last week by Judge Alvin Hellerstein of the U.S. District Court in Manhattan, comes a month after a federal judge in Washington first ordered five reporters from the Washington Post, Newsweek, and other news outlets to name their sources. Since that first order, two of the sources have come forward and identified themselves, according to a letter filed last week by a lawyer for Mr. Hatfill, Charles Kimmett. The letter does not identify the sources beyond saying they are former Justice Department employees, nor does it say to which reporters the sources spoke.

The litigation involving Mr. Ross's sources is proceeding in New York separately because of jurisdictional issues. In the order, Judge Hellerstein, wrote that Mr. Hatfill's interest in learning the sources' identities overcame the First Amendment privilege that protects reporters from testifying about sources.

It is not yet clear whether ABC will appeal the order.

"We believe firmly in honoring promises of confidentiality to our sources, and we are guided by that principle in this case," a spokesman for ABC News, Jeffrey Schneider, said yesterday, declining to comment further.

A lawyer for Mr. Hatfill declined to comment.