Cheney aide indicted
Libby resigns over perjury charges in CIA leak case; Rove probe goes on
WASHINGTON -- I. Lewis ''Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, was indicted yesterday on charges of perjury, making false statements, and obstruction of justice in the investigation into the leaked name of a CIA operative. In a potentially damaging sign for the Bush administration, special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald said that although his investigation is nearly complete, ''it's not over."
Libby, 55, one of the administration's most influential advisers in the decision to invade Iraq, resigned immediately upon being informed of his indictment.
Fitzgerald, after refusing for months to speak to the news media, forcefully defended his decision to indict Libby.
''When a vice president's chief of staff is charged with perjury and obstruction of justice, it does show the world that this is a country that takes its law seriously, that all citizens are bound by the law," Fitzgerald said at a news conference.
Karl Rove, President Bush's deputy chief of staff and close political adviser, was not indicted but still faced the possibility of prosecution. Fitzgerald said his investigation was still ongoing.
Asked whether Rove was ''off the hook," Fitzgerald responded: ''I'm not going to comment on any one name."
The Libby indictment is the latest in a series of problems for Bush, who has suffered from low approval ratings and who on Thursday withdrew the troubled Supreme Court nomination of his counsel, Harriet Miers. In a terse comment to reporters yesterday, Bush said he accepted Libby's resignation and called the charges ''serious." But he cautioned that Libby must be ''presumed innocent and entitled to due process."
Libby said in a statement that it was a ''sad day" but he was ''confident that at the end of this process I will be completely and totally exonerated."
If convicted on all five charges, Libby could receive a maximum of 30 years in prison and a $1.25 million fine.
Cheney issued a statement saying he accepted Libby's resignation ''with deep regret."
''Scooter Libby is one of the most capable and talented individuals I have ever known," Cheney said.
Cheney, and perhaps Bush, might be called to testify at Libby's trial, in a case that could examine the way White House officials sought to rebut criticism of the decision to go to war.
The 22-page indictment of Libby lays out how Cheney's closest adviser allegedly lied to the grand jury about his discussions with reporters about the identity of Valerie Plame Wilson. Libby told the grand jury that he learned of her employment at the CIA from reporters. But the indictment said he learned about Wilson's job from Cheney, an unnamed senior CIA official, an unnamed CIA briefer, an unnamed ''senior White House official," and an unnamed undersecretary of state.
One of the key questions left unanswered by the indictment is whether Cheney played any role in leaking Wilson's identity. At the news conference, Fitzgerald declined to respond to any questions about Cheney's role, saying, ''I'm not making allegations about anyone not charged in the indictment."
Like past Washington scandals, the indictment gave new life to the adage that ''it's not the crime, it's the coverup."
Fitzgerald's investigation initially focused on whether there was a violation of a 1982 law that prohibits government officials from knowingly releasing the name of a covert agent. But Fitzgerald did not bring charges on that statute, which is considered difficult to prosecute because of the need to prove intent.
Instead, Fitzgerald brought five charges: that Libby twice lied to FBI with reporters; twice committed perjury in speaking about his actions to the grand jury; and obstructed justice by trying to impede the grand jury's investigation through a pattern of lies and obfuscations.
Valerie Plame Wilson is the wife of Joseph Wilson, a former US ambassador with experience in Africa. In 2002, Cheney's office asked the CIA to investigate assertions that Iraq was trying to acquire material for nuclear weapons from Niger. The CIA sent Joseph Wilson, who reported back to the CIA that he doubted the assertion that Iraq was seeking a material known as yellowcake from Niger. Nonetheless, Bush said in his January 2003 State of the Union speech that British intelligence had found that Iraq was seeking materials from Africa.
Starting in May 2003, Joseph Wilson became the anonymous source of stories about his doubts that Iraq had sought nuclear materials from Niger and the White House quickly determined that he was the source. That, in turn, led Libby to ask government officials about Joseph Wilson and to determine whether his wife, who worked at the CIA, suggested that the agency send him to investigate Cheney's questions about Niger.
The indictment says that Libby learned about Valerie Plame Wilson's identity from Cheney in June 2003, contradicting Libby's assertion to the grand jury that he learned about her from reporters. ''Libby learned from the Vice President that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA in the Counterproliferation division," the indictment says.
On or around June 11, 2003, Libby was told by an unidentified CIA official ''that Wilson's wife was employed by the CIA and that the idea of sending him to Niger originated with her," according to the indictment. The following day, Libby was told by an unnamed undersecretary of state that Valerie Plame Wilson worked for the CIA. Two days later, Libby discussed both Wilsons with his CIA briefer, the indictment says.
The White House's interest in Valerie Plame Wilson intensified when her husband went public with his doubts in a New York Times op-ed piece in July in which he said that the Bush administration twisted evidence about Iraq's effort to acquire weapons of mass destruction.
The indictment laid out the chronology of Libby's knowledge about Valerie Plame Wilson in an effort to show that he lied about that knowledge when he spoke to the FBI and the grand jury.
For example, the indictment says Libby testified before that grand jury that he learned around July 10, 2003, about Valerie Plame Wilson from Tim Russert, the moderator of NBC-TV's ''Meet the Press." Libby testified that Russert asked whether he knew that Valerie Plame Wilson worked for the CIA. Libby testified that he was surprised to hear that she worked for the CIA, according to the indictment.
The indictment says this was a false statement because ''Libby was well aware that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA and Libby had participated in multiple prior conversations concerning this topic."
Similarly, Libby testified that he told Matthew Cooper of Time magazine on or about July 12, 2003, that he had heard that reporters were saying Wilson's wife worked for the CIA.
The indictment said this was a false statement and that Libby instead ''confirmed to Cooper, without qualification, that Libby had heard that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA."
And, the indictment says, Libby testified that he told Judith Miller of The New York Times on or about July 12, 2003, that he had heard that reporters were saying Valerie Plame Wilson worked for the CIA but that he did not know whether it was true. The indictment said this, too, was a false statement because Libby did not provide such a statement to Miller.
Miller, who spent 85 days in jail before acknowledging that Libby was her source, and who never wrote about the Wilsons, has said that she discussed Valerie Plame Wilson with Libby but could not say who first told her about the agent.
Joseph Wilson, addressing the administration's motive in leaking his wife's CIA job, said in a statement released yesterday, ''I feel that my family was attacked for my speaking the truth about the events that led our country to war."
The indictment provides some clues about unanswered questions in the case.
The indictment says that Libby told then-White House press secretary Ari Fleischer around July 7, 2003, that Valerie Plame Wilson worked at the CIA ''and noted that such information was not widely known."
But the indictment does not say what Fleischer did with that information.
The indictment also says that Libby spoke to a senior White House aide identified only as ''Official A" around July 10, 2003, and that this official had previously spoken about Valerie Plame Wilson with columnist Robert Novak. It was Novak's July 14, 2003, column that disclosed her identity and set the investigation in motion. Novak has never disclosed the names of his two sources for that column.
The Associated Press quoted sources as saying Rove was ''Official A."
Yesterday, Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, said in a statement that Rove was cooperating with the investigation, adding, ''We are confident that when the special counsel finishes his work, he will conclude that Mr. Rove has done nothing wrong."
The special counsel, Fitzgerald, said the term of the grand jury has expired, but he stressed that ''it's an ordinary course to keep a grand jury open to consider other matters, and that's what we will be doing."
He would not comment on whether further indictments would be brought.
''We're not quite done," Fitzgerald said.
''But I don't want to . . . add to a feverish pitch. You know, it's very, very routine that you keep a grand jury available for what you might need. And that's all I can say because of the rules of grand jury secrecy."
Michael Kranish can be reached at kranish@globe.com 