Government officials disclose classified information to the press with some frequency, but only rarely are they prosecuted for it.
Such selective prosecution renders the law unfair, said attorney Abbe Lowell at the April 2 sentencing hearing of his client, Stephen Kim, who pled guilty to an unauthorized disclosure of classified information.
Mr. Kim, a former State Department Korea specialist who could have been sentenced to 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000, received a 13 month jail sentence. The transcript of the April 2 sentencing hearing is now available here.
The fact that senior officials go unpunished for comparable or greater offenses “doesn’t mean that Mr. Kim didn’t violate the law,” said Mr. Lowell. But “it means that our system is out of balance.”
The “antiquated” Espionage Act that is used to prosecute leaks is “one very blunt tool,” Mr. Lowell said.
Still, “There’s some good that can come from this case,” Mr. Lowell suggested. He noted that it had already led the Department of Justice to revise its policy and practice on investigating or charging members of the news media.
In other leak-related news, the Obama Administration argued that there is no privilege that would excuse New York Times reporter James Risen from testifying in court as to the identity of the source who provided him with classified information. In an April 25 brief, the Administration asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reject Mr. Risen’s petition to review the matter.
Meanwhile, former Navy linguist James Hitselberger, who had been charged under the Espionage Act with unlawful retention of national defense information (18 USC 793e), pleaded guilty on April 25 to a lesser offense of unauthorized retention of classified information (18 USC 1924), which carries a sentence of up to one year in prison. He is to be sentenced on July 17. (More from Josh Gerstein in Politico.)
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