Libby sentencing tomorrow

At the moment, we find ourselves engulfed in a late-spring presidential campaign preview.  The Democratic debate was last night.  Today, the Obama, Edwards and Clinton will attend a forum on religion.  It all ends tomorrow with the Republican debate.  But there is another important story going on tomorrow that is worthy of some notice (depending on how you feel about government officials that lie to a grand jury).

Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who was already found guilty in March, will be sentenced tomorrow.  Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald wants Libby to serve three years in prison.  Libby's lawyers want him to do community service instead.

As Time Magazine's Reynolds Holding reveals, last week Fitzgerald released proof of Valerie Plame's covert agent status as a trump card to convince the judge that Libby deserved a harsher sentence:

Thanks to Fitzgerald's brief advocating a stiff sentence for Libby, wefound out last week that the CIA did indeed consider Plame's identityclassified, at least for 18 months. The prosecutor has brought this upnow in apparent support of a remarkable claim: Libby should serve 30 to37 months in prison -- about twice what the federal probation officerecommends and way more than the probation favored by thedefense -- because the underlying (and uncharged) crime was so serious.

The Libby defense team issued one last plea for forgiveness:

"Mr. Libby is known for his fairness and generosity," the defense lawyers write, and "for his caring and unselfish nature."

One thing is for sure: there will be a lot of angry people at the CIA if the judge lets Libby off the hook.  It will have sent a dangerous precedent that it is tolerable for the Executive to bully our agents in the field.

Comments

[granny]

"Mr. Libby is known for his fairness and generosity," the defense lawyers write, and "for his caring and unselfish nature."

He just needs to take greater care in picking his friends, then. They don't have any of those frailties (as he is now learning)

[jaguar]

Former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger was sentenced to community service and probation and fined $50,000 for illegally removing highly classified documents from the National Archives and intentionally destroying some of them.
I don't recall a lot of angry peope at the CIA when the judge let Sandy "Socks" Berger off the hook. I guess its OK to set a precedent that it is tolerable to destroy classified documents on terrorism from the National Archive.