Journalist Josh Wolf's Courageous Stand

Josh Wolf, 24, has spent almost six months in jail, more time than any journalist in U.S. history, for protecting his sources. He was jailed on Aug. 1 of last year when he refused to turn over video that he had shot of an anti-G8 demonstration in San Francisco to a federal grand jury.

Wolf had sold some of the footage to the nightly news as well as posted some on his website. The news broadcast attracted the attention of local and federal law enforcement agents who were investigating clashes between the police and demonstrators at the protest. They later served Wolf a federal subpoena requiring him to turn over his unpublished video footage as well as testify about the protesters seen on the tape. When Wolf refused to comply, he was charged with contempt of court and incarcerated.

Wolf's imprisonment has prompted outcries by advocates for freedom of the press who say it is out of proportion to the scale of the investigation. Lucie Morrillon of Reporters without Borders has stated, ''This is one more example of the increasing attacks on confidentiality of sources in the United States, one more blow to investigative journalism and, eventually, to the right for American people to be informed. This is a bad signal sent to the rest of the world.''

On Friday we spoke with Josh Wolf from his jail cell in Dublin, Calif. I began by asking him why he was in prison.

We asked a spokesman for the U.S Attorney's office to join us on the program today. He declined our invitation, but Luke Macaulay, spokesperson for the U.S Attorney's office for the Northern District of California sent a statement. It reads: "We have an obligation to the community to investigate and gather evidence of serious crimes. The incident is under investigation so that the grand jury can determine what, if any, crimes were committed. As our court filings state, Wolf videotaped a public demonstration where there may have been an attempt to set a police car ablaze, and where a San Francisco police officer's skull was fractured when he was hit from behind by a demonstrator. Six separate judges -- one federal magistrate judge, two federal district court judges, and a panel of three Ninth Circuit judges -- have now ruled that this office has issued a lawful subpoena for legitimate investigative purposes, and that the material and testimony in question should be provided to the grand jury."

Martin Garbus is Josh Wolf's attorney. Time magazine calls him "one of the best trial lawyers in the country," while the National Law Journal has named him one of the country's top ten litigators. He joins me in the studio today.

Amy Goodman: On Friday, we spoke with Josh Wolf from his jail cell in Dublin, Calif. I began by asking him why he's in prison.

Josh Wolf: I'm here for refusing to comply with a subpoena demanding that I both testify and turn over a tape of a protest that occurred on July 8, 2005.

AG: Why are you refusing to comply?

JW: Well, there's a number of reasons. It's been viewed that the tape is central to the issue, but it's also the testimony. Essentially, what the government wants me to do, as we can tell, is to identify civil dissidents who were attending this march, who were in mask and clearly did not want to be identified, but whose identities I may know some of, as their contact that I've been following in documenting civil dissent in the San Francisco Bay Area for some two and a half years now.

AG: U.S. Attorney Kevin Ryan's office says they're investigating whether protesters tried to torch a police car. Ryan's spokesperson, Luke Macauley, said the grand jury needs the video to "determine what, if any, crimes were committed." Your response?

JW: Well, my response is that we've offered to turn the video over to the judge to review in camera to determine whether or not there is any evidence on the tape. The U.S. Attorney's office has said that that would not be appropriate, because there's certain information that only the grand jury is privy to. I don't understand why the grand jury information can't be then passed on to the judge, who can balance all these factors and determine whether or not there is any evidence on the tape, which I contend to this day there isn't, because all newsworthy material on the video was put out online the night of the incident, because I had no idea this was going to all bubble up when I was shooting the video that night and editing it down later on.