CASE STUDY:Defining a journalist
Special Citation: Vanessa Leggett
Vanessa Leggett was released from the Federal Detention Center in Houston on January 4, 2002 after 168 days of incarceration. Leggett was jailed because she refused to turn over her notes for a true-crime book that she was in the process of writing. Leggett spent more time in jail than any other journalist in US history.
Leggett, who lectures at a local Houston college, is a writer. She was working on a book on the death of a Houston woman, Doris Angleton, who was found shot to death in April 1997. Angleton’s millionaire bookie husband Robert and his brother Roger were charged in the case. The brother committed suicide in jail in February 1998. A state court jury acquitted the husband, and a federal investigation of his dead brother soon followed.
Leggett became interested in the case early on. She was already a criminologist specializing in domestic homicide and had decided to write a book on the Angleton case. The day before Roger Angleton committed suicide, Leggett interviewed him in jail. He left a note admitting his own guilt and exonerating his brother, the murdered woman’s husband.
Prior to Robert Angleton’s trial, Leggett turned over to local authorities the information she had gathered in her interview with Roger. This information suggested that, despite the suicide note, Robert Angleton had asked his brother to murder Doris. The evidence was not used in the trial and Leggett was not asked to testify. Robert Angleton was acquitted. It turned out that he had been an informant for the Houston police and the FBI.
Subsequently, the FBI asked Leggett to become a paid informant. She refused. They also asked her to delay the publication of her book. She refused. The FBI responded with a subpoena demanding that she turn over every note she had concerning her book in progress, which would have prevented her from continuing her work on the book. She defied the subpoena and was subsequently jailed for contempt of court. Texas has no shield laws protecting journalists or their sources.
The essence of the argument for jailing Leggett was this: The prosecution said that Leggett was not a journalist. She only had one published article in an obscure FBI journal. She did not make her living as a journalist. She also did not have a contract for the publishing of her proposed book.
Leggett's defenders said that she is considered a journalist because she meets the government's own test. In its panel decision of August 17, the court said that it would consider whether the person “(1) is engaged in investigative reporting; (2) is gathering news; and (3) possesses the intent at the inception of the news gathering process to disseminate the news to the public.” According to these criteria, her defenders say, Leggett is a journalist because she was in the process of gathering news for her book.
Leggett was ultimately released because the grand jury before which she was ordered to testify had completed its term, which meant there was no longer any way for the witness to comply with the subpoena. She could be subpoenaed again if another grand jury is convened to deal with the case or if Robert Angleton is ever indicted.
CASE STUDY QUESTIONS
- Write down your personal definition of what you think a journalist is.
- Are there any categories of writers you would exempt from your definition? If so, why?
- According to your definition, do you think Vanessa Leggett should be considered a journalist? Why or why not?
- Do you think journalists and their sources should be protected from prosecution? Why or why not?
- Other professionals, such as physicians, have to carry insurance to protect them from law suits, for example. How are journalists similarly protected? Do you think they should be?
- To what extent, if any, do you think a journalist is obligated like the rest of us to aid in criminal investigations?
