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发帖数: 29846 | 1 By EVAN PEREZ
WASHINGTON—A former Central Intelligence Agency officer was sentenced
Friday to 2½ years in prison for disclosing information to a reporter
identifying a covert agent.
A federal judge in Alexandria, Va., sentenced John Kiriakou, 48 years old,
to 30 months in prison as part of an agreement with prosecutors. U.S.
District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema rejected claims that Mr. Kiriakou was a
whistleblower, as his supporters have portrayed him, according to a
spokesman for the prosecutors. The judge said she would have imposed a much
stiffer sentence, perhaps closer to the eight to 10 years recommended under
current guidelines.
The U.S. attorney's office for Virginia's Eastern District prosecuted Mr.
Kiriakou, accusing him of disclosing information on two covert CIA
operatives after Guantanamo Bay detainees were found with photos of
counterterrorism investigators.
The plea deal came in October after Judge Brinkema ruled that prosecutors
wouldn't have to prove Mr. Kiriakou intended to harm the U.S. by leaking the
information.
Judge Brinkema ruled that because Mr. Kiriakou was a government employee
with security clearances he clearly understood the rules about disclosing
classified information.
The judge said prosecutors had to show only that the information could be
used to harm the U.S.
Mr. Kiriakou was charged in April with disclosing classified information
identifying a covert agent, illegally disclosing national-defense
information and making false statements.
The probe began in 2009 when authorities discovered that detainees at
Guantanamo Bay possessed photographs of CIA and Federal Bureau of
Investigation personnel. Eventually the FBI concluded Mr. Kiriakou gave the
name of one covert operative to a journalist, who then passed it on to a
private investigator working for the lawyer of a Guantanamo detainee.
U.S. Attorney Neil MacBride said Mr. Kiriakou "betrayed the trust bestowed
upon him by the United States and he betrayed his colleagues whose secrecy
is their only safety."
Jesselyn Radack, a lawyer representing Mr. Kiriakou, said of the judge's
rejection of her client's whistleblower claim: "One becomes a whistleblower
through operation of law by making a disclosure he reasonably believes
evidences abuse or illegality. John's myriad disclosures about torture
clearly fit the bill."
Mr. Kiriakou has been involved in the debate about torture of terrorism
detainees and whether the use of waterboarding, or simulated drowning, as an
interrogation tool provided useful intelligence. In a 2007 ABC News
interview, he said that for a short period after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror
attacks, waterboarding was a useful tool. He said in the interview that al
Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah "answered every question" after one brief
waterboarding and provided information that helped authorities disrupt
attacks.
Later, after the Obama administration released information on the CIA
interrogation program showing Mr. Zubaydah was subjected to waterboarding at
least 83 times, Mr. Kiriakou rescinded his account, saying he relied on
secondhand information and didn't participate in the Abu Zubaydah
interrogation. |
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