At 06:12 PM 8/25/01 -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote:
I agree that John Young should be considered a reporter. And also a ...
Still, I think it's possible to differentiate between people involved or suspected of being involved in a criminal act (Clinton, Tripp, Condit, perhaps Vinnie, in your example) and neutral observers and commentators.
Ho-ho, but JY is a known subscriber/contributor to the same Conspiracy List as JB, CJ, etc. (As are you..) Ergo, a sufficiently rabid [per|pro]secutor could strip you of your 'neutrality'. (What's to stop Vinnie from starting a website covering the Mob to gain journalists' protections?) What's to stop a prosecutor for arguing that a journalist who publishes mostly in, e.g., lefty mags is not part of the Conspiracy du jour? What you and Tim ought to consider IMHO is that the 5th amendment's protection against self-incrimination protects everyone, and journalists don't need 'special' status under such a reading. All you need to do is realize how easily you can be painted into a conspiracy, or charged with an offense under some 'good-samaritan' (compulsory intervention) law. That is sufficient linkage between possible-testimony and self-incrimination. (Except when a grand jury abuses its ability to grant immunity...another thread.) That certainly would have excused JY from answering *anything*, regardless of his status as a Protected Species or not. In the case of that author who is writing her first book about some murder she's researched, she is probably 'guilty' of not reporting what she's learned, under some screwed law somewhere.