BIN LADEN RAID
Prosecution? No.
Leak: In the aftermath of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, anonymous U.S. officials talked to reporters about everything from the most minute details of the operation itself to the fake vaccination drive that the CIA set up in Abbottabad, Pakistan, to obtain DNA from the al Qaeda leader's family. In May, the government watchdog group Judicial Watch revealed that the CIA, the Pentagon, and the White House granted Hollywood filmmakers access to a Navy SEAL who was involved in planning the raid. Earlier this week, John McCain suggested that the administration's "flurry of anonymous boasting" about the bin Laden operation had outed Shakil Afridi, the Pakistani doctor who ran the CIA's vaccination program and was recently sentenced to 33 years in prison by a Pakistani court for high treason.
OPERATION MERLIN
Prosecution? Yes.
Leak: In 2011, a former CIA officer named Jeffrey Sterling was arrested for disclosing classified information to New York Times reporter James Risen (shown above) about Operation Merlin, a failed CIA effort to undermine Iran's nuclear program, which Risen used in his 2006 book State of War. Later in 2011, Risen fought a subpoena to testify at Sterling's trial in what he characterized as a defense of "the First Amendment and freedom of the press." A federal appeals court panel is still deciding whether Risen should be forced to testify, as Sterling's trial hangs in the balance. "Sanger writes on successful Iranian operation, gets wide access," AP reporter Matt Apuzzo tweeted last week, in reference to David Sanger's recent articles in the New York Times on Obama's cyberattacks against Iran. "Risen writes on botched Iranian operation, gets subpoenaed."
Alex Wong/Getty Images for Meet the Press
SUBJECTS:
