Jan 25 - Ex-CIA officer gets 30 months for leaking agent’s name to media

A former CIA officer who leaked cla#sified information, including the identities of agency operatives involved in the capture and interrogation of alleged terrorists, was sentenced Friday to 30 months in prison.

John Kiriakou, 48, who was among the first to go public with details about the CIA’s use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation measures, was charged with disclosing cla#sified information to reporters and lying to the agency about the origin of other sensitive material he published in a book. He pleaded guilty in October to a single charge of leaking the identity of one of the agency’s covert operatives to a reporter.

“This is not a case of a whistleblower,” U.S. District Court Judge Leonie M. Brinkema said in Alexandria. “This is a case of a man who betrayed a solemn trust.”

Kiriakou did not speak at his sentencing hearing. But his lawyer, Robert Trout, said Kiriakou never intended to do harm to the United States or “cause injury to anyone.”

“He was concerned about certain practices that were employed in the war against terror,” Trout said.

In its original criminal filing, the Justice Department obscured many of the details of Kiriakou’s alleged disclosures. But the document suggests that Kiriakou was a source for stories by the New York Times and other news organizations in 2008 and 2009 about some of the agency’s most sensitive operations after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. These include the capture of alleged al-Qaeda operative Abu Zubaida and the interrogation of the self-proclaimed mastermind of the attacks,Khalid Sheik Mohammed.

The Justice Department said that the information Kiriakou supplied to journalists also contributed to a subsequent security breach at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, enabling defense attorneys there to obtain photographs of CIA operatives suspected of being involved in harsh interrogations. Some of the pictures were subsequently discovered in the cells of high-value detainees.

Kiriakou’s pleaded guilty to a violation of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, which had not yielded a conviction in 27 years.

Kiriakou worked for the CIA from 1990 to 2004.

Staff writer Greg Miller contributed to this report.

Obama Signs Whistleblower Protection Bill into Law

November 27, 2012
By Samuel Rubenfeld

President Barack Obama signed new whistleblower protections into law, the White House said Tuesday.

The law, known as the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act (pdf), expands protections for federal workers who blow the whistle on misconduct, fraud and illegality.

It clarifies the scope of protected disclosures, tightens requirements for non-disclosure agreements, expands penalties for violating protections and adds to the staff of some federal agencies an ombudsman whose job will be to educate agency employees of their rights, a statement said.

The bill pa#sed the Senate two weeks ago by unanimous consent after the House pa#sed it in September during a pro-forma session.

"This is a small but meaningful step," said Stephen Kohn, executive director of the National Whistleblowers Center, in a statement. "The bill contains important reforms, but federal employees still lack most of the basic rights available to whistleblowers in the private sector."

Informants in the private sector who expose violations of securities law can receive between 10% and 30% of a penalty if it's more than $1 million under a program created by the Dodd-Frank Act. The program received more than 3,000 tips in the past year.

"We hope that President Obama and Congress will continue their efforts to ensure federal employees are fully protected during the next Congress," Kohn said.

WASHINGTON -- A bipartisan group of lawmakers concerned about whistleblower protections in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) say President Obama is unnecessarily trying to end-run those safeguards, and they are asking him to instead abide by the letter of the law.

Obama issued a signing statement circumventing the NDAA's whistleblower protections, saying he would interpret the law in a way that still allowed the heads of federal agencies to "supervise, control, and correct employees' communications with the Congress" if those communications "reveal information that is properly privileged or otherwise confidential."

In a Thursday letter to the president obtained by The Huffington Post, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), Sen. Charles Gra#sley (R-Iowa), Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) noted that Congress had already carved out exceptions for employees working in intelligence, rendering the president's signing statement unnecessary.

Congress had inserted language into the NDAA extending whistleblower protections to 12 million employees of federal contractors. Those measures would apply to Defense Department contractors, subcontractors and grant recipients permanently and to other federal agency contrators as part of a four-year pilot program.

The four members of Congress said they were concerned Obama's statement "may be perceived as undermining Congressional intent and discouraging individuals from helping to protect taxpayer dollars." It could also be perceived as "eroding" protections for federal workers and discouraging them from exposing improper behavior, they said.

"The Legislative Branch has the Constitutionally-mandated authority and responsibility to oversee the Executive Brach, and federal employees and government contractors have the right and obligation to bring information to Congress in a lawful manner," the lawmakers wrote. "We encourage you to enforce the law as written. In doing so, your administration will show its dedication to transparancey and accountability at all levels of the federal government."

Lawmakers from both parties are urging President Barack Obama to institute the enhanced whistleblower protections in the new defense authorization bill, despite his criticism of the provisions.

“We are concerned your statement that accompanied the signing of the [fiscal 2013 National Defense Authorization Act] into law may be perceived as undermining congressional intent and discouraging individuals from helping to protect taxpayer dollars,” Sens. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) and Charles Gra#sley (R-Iowa) and Reps. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) wrote in a Jan. 17 lettter. “Furthermore, your statement could be perceived as potentially eroding protections for federal workers and discouraging them from helping expose improper behavior.”

The four lawmakers noted that, since they oversee the executive branch, both public-sector and private-sector employees have an obligation to bring information to Congress. They encouraged Obama to have his administration enforce the defense bill’s provisions to “show its dedication to transparency and accountability.”

McCaskill has been a senior member of the committees on Armed Services and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. Gra#sley has been a senior Finance Committee member. Issa and Cummings are the chairman and ranking member, respectively, of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Outside experts have suggested Obama’s statement creates doubt about how agencies will handle whistleblower protections for contractors.

“We are really pleased to see these members of Congress standing up for whistleblowers and their constitutional duties of oversight,” said Angela Canterbury, director for public policy at the Project on Government Oversight. “Congress has far too often ceded power to the presidency. But these lawmakers are obviously not rolling over.”

Canterbury added that POGO would be doing its part to support whistleblowers as well.

“We will be keeping a close eye on how the new whistleblower protections are put into practice,” she said. Obama’s comments “already caused confusion, and very likely will create a chilling effect on disclosures of waste, fraud, and abuse. Congress needs to make it clear that the president cannot limit their right to know.”

The president signed the defense bill into law on Jan. 2, but also issued an accompanying signing statement that said the provisions allowing contractors to expose government waste and gross mismanagement directly to Congress “could be interpreted in a manner that would interfere with my authority to manage and direct executive branch officials.”

Obama warned lawmakers that his administration will closely watch contractors’ interactions with Congress. “I will interpret those sections consistent with my authority to direct the heads of executive departments to supervise, control, and correct employees’ communications with the Congress in cases where such communications would be unlawful or would reveal information that is properly privileged or otherwise confidential,” he wrote.

The law protects contractor employees who disclose information that they reasonably believe to be evidence of gross mismanagement, abuse of authority, or violations of laws, including regulations regarding contract negotiations and awards. The bill permanently covers all employees of defense contractors and subcontractors who bring forth the evidence, and states that the new rights cannot be waived under any agreement or policy.

The bill also extends protections to whistleblowers who are hara#sed or fired by a contractor at the government’s direction. And it est@blishes a four-year pilot program enhancing whistleblower protections applicable to all civilian federal agency contractors. Those protections then could become permanent.

Wonder if he's gonna make it out of prison.

Wonder if he's gonna make it out of prison.

that's what he been doing, says one thing and signs one bill, then turns around and sneak signs something else that omits the first bill he bragged about but u hear him say not a damn word about the bill he signed undermining it, typical politician [pic]

Wonder if he's gonna make it out of prison.

Prolly not... Hell get that badleynmanning treatment for his betrayal[pic] this ain't private industry... It's the CIA... Not a good look.

highly unlikely