Word: farbers
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Jersey Supreme Court upheld criminal contempt charges against Myron Farber and The New York Times, rejecting arguments that the first amendment allows a reporter to shield notes and confidential sources. The right of the defendant in the murder case, Dr. Philip Jascelevich, to subpoena testimony in his defense overrides Farber's rights of confidentiality, the court said...
...Should Farber, whose reporting led to a doctor's indictment for murder, be forced to turn over all his files and notes for a judge to look at in camera! To do so, argues the Times, would be an offense against the freedom of the press guaranteed by the First Amendment. Not to turn over the files, pleaded the defense lawyer, would be to deny his client the right to a fair trial, guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment. When the First and Sixth Amendments collide, lawyers and judges (being a closed society) tend to take the Sixth. Law, more...
...layman, the Farber case seems less a study in press rights and privileges than in how quickly law rallies around and sustains even a bad decision. Reporters often promise confidentiality to get a story; if they can routinely be made to break such promises in court they become an unwilling "arm of the law." So in practice some judges have ordered confidential documents sur rendered only if three tests are met: that there is a "compelling state interest"; that the evidence sought can be shown to be relevant ("particularity"); and that it cannot be obtained in any other...
James Goodale, executive vice president of the Times for legal matters, points out that Nixon got a hearing before turning over his papers. And though U.S. Attorney Gen eral Griffin Bell was recently cited for contempt for protecting FBI sources, nobody put him in jail, like Farber, while the appeals went on. Yet a federal judge in New Jersey, refusing to release Farber and calling him "evil," ruled so intemperately that he didn't even get his facts straight. The Farber case seems to have this effect. He had "discovered" that Farber had a $75,000 advance...
Strong stuff from a federal judge, and some journalistic defenders immediately got nervous. "Farber ought to throw in his hand ... [There is] a ring around the collar on his white robes of virtue. It won't wash," wrote Conservative Columnist James J. Kilpatrick. "The dollar sign has risen to taint [Farber's] martyrdom," wrote Charles B. Seib, ombudsman of the Washington Post-the paper whose Watergate reporters, Woodward and Bernstein, have made more money from investigative reporting converted into books than any other journalists in history. FARBER CASE DULLS THE EDGE OF THE PRESS'S SILVER SWORD...