FBI bypasses First Amendment to nail a hacker

[bushclipper]

Citing a provision of the Patriot Act, the FBI is sending letters to journalists telling them to secretly prepare to turn over their notes, e-mails and sources to the bureau.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/33106.html

[Lindsay]

1. Oh, this is ugly.

This is very, very ugly.

<snip>

None of this explains the cloak of secrecy the FBI has thrown over the whole affair. Reporters are being told that this is an official criminal investigation, and asked not to tell anyone. Even the DOJ's proposals for secret administrative subpoenas announced this month as part of USA-PATRIOT II would allow recipients of such subpoenas to confer with their own lawyers and others necessary to enforce the subpoena. The FBI request here made it clear that they didn't want the reporters talking to anyone, because that would supposedly harm the ongoing criminal investigation.

on edit - added the excerpt.

[Gman]

2. Why not use this on Bob Novak to find out who blew Ms. Wilson's

cover?

The DOJ's position on this hacker case would be directly applicable to Novak and the Ms. Wilson case.