Kiriakou Defenders Hope to Get Whistle-Blower’s Prison Sentence Commuted

[marmar]

from truthdig:


Kiriakou Defenders Hope to Get Whistle-Blower’s Prison Sentence Commuted

Posted on Jan 23, 2013
By Thomas Hedges, Center for Study of Responsive Law


High-profile defenders of John Kiriakou have written President Barack Obama to request that he commute the whistle-blower’s sentence or pardon him.

Kiriakou was charged with violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, allegedly disclosing classified information to members of the news media after speaking out against waterboarding in 2007. He pleaded guilty in October as part of an agreement that would sentence him to 30 months in prison.

Those who have signed the letters in support of Kiriakou are politically varied. Among them are constitutional lawyer Bruce Fein, consumer advocate Ralph Nader, former Public Citizen president Joan Claybrook, former senior official from the departments of State, Defense and National Security Council Morton Halperin, CNN senior political analyst David Gergen and retired CIA officer Raymond McGovern. Others include 10 former CIA agents and five professors from Liberty University in Virginia.

“Mr. Kiriakou is a highly decorated, 14-year CIA counterterrorism veteran who has spent his entire adult life in public service,” the letters read. He “is an anti-torture whistleblower who spoke out against torture because he believed it violated his oath to the Constitution. He never tortured anyone, yet he is the only individual to be prosecuted in relation to the torture program of the past decade. ..................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/kiriakou_defenders_hope_to_commute_whistle-blowers_prison_sentence_20130123/

[leveymg]

1. " He never tortured anyone, yet he is the only individual to be prosecuted"

That says it all, right there about what this government's priorities are. One can't help but notice also that this post has so far been virtually ignored here. What does that say about what we've become? Is DU now just a cheering section for this Admin., no matter what it does?