N.Y. Times Asks Court to Limit Probe

Government Seeks Reporters' Phone Records on Islamic Charities

The New York Times asked the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday to block the federal government from reviewing the phone records of two reporters in a leak investigation.

The case involved stories written in 2001, by Times reporters Judith Miller and Philip Shenon, that revealed the government's plans to freeze the assets of two Islamic charities, the Holy Land Foundation and the Global Relief Foundation.

In a 2 to 1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit ruled in August that federal prosecutors can see the phone records of Shenon and Miller. Miller retired from the Times a year ago.

The government says phone calls placed by the reporters seeking comment for a story tipped off the charities to planned government raids. A federal judge who ruled in the newspaper's favor said there is no evidence in the record suggesting the reporters even knew of the government's plans to raid either charity.

The Times wants Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to temporarily block the government from going through the records so that the newspaper can prepare a petition arguing why the justices should step into the case. Ginsburg asked the Justice Department for a response.

U.S. District Judge Robert W. Sweet had ruled that the records were off-limits unless prosecutors could show that they had exhausted all other means of finding out who spoke to the reporters.

But the three-judge appeals court panel said a grand jury investigation of the disclosures would be unlikely to go anywhere without help from the reporters or access to their records.