Nation in brief: Court sides with anthrax reporter
A federal appeals court Tuesday blocked fines of up to $5,000 that a former USA Today reporter was ordered to pay each day she refuses to reveal her confidential sources for stories about the criminal investigation of the 2001 anthrax attacks.
The appeals court granted the request of Toni Locy, who had been ordered by a federal judge to pay the fines out of her own pocket while she appeals an order finding her in contempt of court.
U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton is demanding that Locy provide the names of all dozen or so Justice Department and FBI sources who provided her information for stories on the probe into the anthrax attacks.
The order from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia means Locy will not have to pay the fines or face further sanctions including possibly being sent to jail while her lawyers fight Walton’s contempt ruling.
Locy says she cannot recall which of her FBI and Justice Department sources provided her information for two stories about scientist Steven Hatfill.
Detroit
911 operator must serve probation
A 911 operator who authorities say didn’t take seriously a boy’s calls to report that his mother had collapsed was sentenced Tuesday to serve a year of probation for willful neglect of duty.
The mother was found dead three hours after the call, taken by Sharon Nichols.
District Judge Paula Humphries on Tuesday also sentenced Nichols, 45, to perform 15 days of community service. Humphries could have given the woman a year in jail for the misdemeanor but noted that she had no previous criminal record.
Nichols had testified at trial that she could not hear the boy, then 5 years old. Authorities say Robert Turner called 911 in Detroit twice on Feb. 20, 2006, to report that Sherrill Turner, 46, had passed out.
Nichols, who was fired from her job as a 911 operator in July 2006, declined a chance to speak at the sentencing.
Pittsburgh
Dad wins millions against troopers
A federal jury Tuesday awarded $28 million to the father of an unarmed 12-year-old boy fatally shot by state troopers as he ran from a stolen vehicle they had cornered.
The jury found both troopers intentionally shot Michael Ellerbe during the Christmas Eve 2002 chase.
The verdict contradicted the troopers’ claim that only one shot Ellerbe – and then only because the officer believed the boy had shot his partner.
Attorneys for the boy’s father, Michael Hickenbottom, said the verdict and trial testimony should renew an investigation.
Troopers Samuel Nassan and Juan Curry “lied, covered up, fabricated in order to avoid responsibility, and those in power went along with it,” said Geoffrey Fieger, one of Hickenbottom’s attorneys.
The troopers’ attorney, Andrew Fletcher, promised an appeal.