I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, a former high-ranking official in the George W. Bush administration, was put on trial in 2007 for interfering with special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's criminal investigation of the Plame affair.
Libby served as Assistant to the President under George W. Bush and Chief of Staff to the Vice President of the United States and Assistant to the Vice President for National Security Affairs under Dick Cheney from 2001 to 2005. Libby resigned from his government positions hours after his indictment on October 28, 2005.
Libby was indicted by a federal grand jury on five felony counts of making false statements to federal investigators, perjury for lying to a federal grand jury, and obstruction of justice for impeding the course of a federal grand jury investigation. The case was concerned with the possibly illegal leaking by government officials of the classified identity of Valerie Plame Wilson, a covert agent of the CIA. She was also the wife of former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV. Pursuant to the subsequent trial, Libby was convicted on March 6, 2007, on four counts of perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements. He was acquitted of one count of making false statements.
Libby was sentenced to 30 months in prison and fined $250,000. The sentence was commuted in June 2007 by President Bush, voiding the prison term. The convictions no longer stand on the record because Libby was pardoned by President Donald Trump on April 13, 2018.
On April 3, 2007, the District of Columbia Bar suspended Libby's license to practice law in Washington, D.C., and recommended his disbarment pending his appeal of his conviction.The D.C. Bar revised its "Professional Rules of Conduct" on February 1, 2007, according to its "Bar News" section of its website; accessed June 5, 2007. On April 3, 2007, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals filed an "Order" ("In the Matter of I. Lewis Libby, Jr. ... Bar Registration No. 950758"), suspending Libby "immediately from the practice of law in the District of Columbia pending resolution of this matter [in United States v. Libby]", which the Office of Bar Counsel (D.C. Bar) received on April 4, 2007, directing it to "inform the Court if the matter is resolved without the necessity of further court action." In that order, "the Board directed the Bar Counsel to file a brief addressing whether [Libby's] crimes inherently involve moral turpitude." In its brief, filed on April 24, 2007, entitled "Statement of Bar Counsel", the D.C. Bar stated that his crimes amounted to "moral turpitude" and recommended to the District of Columbia Court of Appeals Board on Professional Responsibility that Libby "be disbarred pursuant to D.C. Code § 11-2503(a)", which reads (in pertinent part): "When a member of the bar of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals is convicted of an offense involving moral turpitude ... the court shall, pending final determination of an appeal from the conviction, suspend the member of the bar from practice ... If a final judgment of conviction is certified to the court, the name of the member of the bar so convicted shall be struck from the roll of the members of the bar and such person shall thereafter cease to be a member." Pursuant to the policy on "Moral Turpitude" contained therein, it is also noted (n. 4) that Libby's "disbarment should be deemed to commence, for reinstatement purposes, on April 11, 2007, the date that [he] filed an affidavit in compliance with D.C. Bar R. XI, § 14(g)." The brief lists Libby's admission to practice law in that jurisdiction as May 19, 1978. At that time Libby's lawyers filed notification of his intention to appeal his conviction within ten days after his sentencing with the D.C. Bar, an appeal that he subsequently decided to drop (Cf. Apuzzo's account of December 10, 2007, op cit) On March 20, 2008, after he dropped his appeal, he was disbarred by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals, in Washington, D.C., at least until 2012.Carol D. Leonnig, "Court Disbars Cheney Ex-Aide: Libby Loses Right To Practice Law", The Washington Post, p. A2, March 21, 2008
He delayed reinstatement until June 2016, when he successfully petitioned the court for reinstatement. He was readmitted to the D.C. bar on November 3, 2016."Lewis Libby". nndb.com. Retrieved January 28, 2015
In the District of Columbia Court of Appeals Disciplinary Counsel's Report reinstating Libby's law license, the Counsel noted that Libby had continued to assert his innocence. As a result, the Counsel had to "undertake a more complex evaluation of a Petition for reinstatement" than when a petitioner admits guilt. But the Counsel found that "Libby has presented credible evidence in support of his version of events and it appears that one key prosecution witness , Judith Miller, has changed her recollection of the events in question."Disciplinary Counsel's Report regarding Petitioner's Petition for Reinstatement. Bar Docket No. 2016-D182. p. 5 The reference to Judith Miller, a former New York Times reporter, involved her memoir, The Story, A Reporter's Journey. In the book, Miller said she read Plame's memoir and discovered that Plame's cover was at the State Department, a fact Miller said the prosecution had withheld from her. In rereading what she called her "elliptical" notes (meaning hard to decipher), she realized they were about Plame's cover, not her job at the CIA. She concluded that her testimony that Libby had told her Plame worked at the CIA was wrong. "Had I helped convict an innocent man?" she asked.Miller, Judith. The Story, A Reporter's Journey. Simon and Schuster 2015. pp. 307-310. Miller went on to note that John Rizzo, a former CIA general counsel, had said in his memoir that there was no evidence that the outing of Plame had caused any damage to CIA operations or agents, including Plame.Miller, p. 312 That statement rebuts the prosecution's closing argument that as a result of the disclosure of Plame's identity, a CIA operative could be "arrested, tortured, or killed."Transcript of oral argument at p. 130, In re I. Lewis Libby, No. 1:2005-CR-00394-RBWConflict of interest disclosure: The author of this update worked briefly for Libby's defense team about a decade ago and has known Libby for decades. This relationship in no way distorts the validity of the information from the sources cited.
Events leading up to the trial
The Plame affair
The Plame affair ensued after the identity of Valerie Plame was leaked to journalists, which took place after her husband Joseph Wilson criticized the Bush administration's rationale for the Iraq War on July 6, 2003 by publicly stating that he had found no evidence for the claim that Saddam Hussein's regime had attempted to buy yellowcake uranium in Niger (a claim that first emerged due to the Niger uranium forgeries) in a New York Times op-ed entitled "What I Didn't Find in Africa".
Wilson had been sent on a fact-finding mission to Niger but had found no evidence for the claim that Iraq had been attempting to buy yellowcake uranium in Africa, as part of an active weapons of mass destruction program. Nonetheless, this claim was repeated by president Bush during the Iraq disarmament crisis that preceded the Iraq War. President Bush's controversial "16 words" in his 2003 State of the Union Address alluded to the Niger claim: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.""President Delivers "State of the Union: The U.S. Capitol", press release, The White House, January 28, 2003, accessed July 23, 2007. (Full transcript of the speech.)"16 Words", CNN.com, March 7, 2003, accessed July 23, 2007. Bush's claim was apparently based on the forged uranium documents. On March 7, 2003, 11 days before the United States-led coalition invasion of Iraq, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released its report determining that documents indirectly cited by President Bush as suggesting that Iraq had tried to buy 500 tons of uranium from Niger were actually "obvious" forgeries."Transcript of El Baradei's U.N. Presentation", CNN, March 7, 2003, accessed July 28, 2007.
On July 14, 2003, a newspaper column commenting on Wilson's claims written by Robert Novak, entitled "Mission to Niger", disclosed Plame's name and status as an "operative" who worked in a CIA division on the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Wilson, her husband, stated in various interviews and subsequent writings (as listed in his 2004 memoir The Politics of Truth) that his wife's identity was covert and that members of the administration knowingly revealed it as retribution for his op-ed entitled "What I Didn't Find in Africa", published in The New York Times on July 6, 2003.Joseph C. Wilson 4th, "What I Didn't Find in Africa", The New York Times, July 6, 2003, accessed June 10, 2007. Some argue that his wife's employment at the CIA was no longer classified: Victoria Toensing, who helped craft the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, claims in her Washington Post opinion piece "The Plame Game: Was This a Crime?" that since Valerie Plame had not held a foreign post for over five years, she no longer qualified for covert status.
On September 26, 2003, at the request of the CIA, the Department of Justice and the FBI began a criminal investigation into the possible unauthorized disclosure of classified information regarding Valerie Wilson's CIA affiliation to various reporters in the spring of 2003. During this ongoing federal inquiry "into the alleged unauthorized disclosure of a CIA employee's identity," a possible violation of criminal statutes, including the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, and Title 18, United States Code, Section 793, Libby testified to FBI agents and to the grand jury.
Libby was charged with lying to FBI agents and to the grand jury about two conversations with reporters, Tim Russert of NBC News and Matthew Cooper of Time magazine. According to the Indictment, the obstruction of justice count alleges that while testifying under oath before the grand jury on March 5 and March 24, 2004, Libby knowingly and corruptly endeavored to influence, obstruct and impede the grand jury's investigation by misleading and deceiving the grand jury as to when, and the manner and means by which, he acquired, and subsequently disclosed to the media, information concerning the employment of Valerie Wilson by the CIA.
CIA grand jury investigation On December 30, 2003, Patrick J. Fitzgerald was named Special Counsel by Deputy Attorney General James B. Comey and charged with conducting the investigation into the Plame affair.James B. Comey, (letter to Patrick J. Fitzgerald), December 30, 2003, accessed March 18, 2006. Fitzgerald was granted the full plenary power of the Attorney General in the Libby case, as clarified by Comey in letters of February 6, 2004, and August 12, 2005.James B. Comey, to Patrick J. Fitzgerald, February 6, 2004, accessed July 17, 2007.James B. Comey, (letters to Patrick J. Fitzgerald, related memoranda, and transcripts), December 30, 2003 to March 17, 2006, accessed July 17, 2007.
On October 28, 2005, after twenty-two months of investigation, a federal grand jury indicted Libby in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. On November 3, 2005, Libby appeared at his arraignment before Judge Reggie B. Walton and pleaded not guilty. , United States of America v. I. Lewis Libby, United States District Court for the District of Columbia, October 28, 2005, accessed February 10, 2007.