David Shuster of MSNBC just reported that there is “no indication” there will be an announcement from Patrick Fitzgerald today. The grand jury is meeting and is probably hearing Fitzpatrick’s recommendations today, Shuster said. Tomorrow, maybe.
Update: Jason Leopold and John Byrne of Raw Story report:
Special Prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald has asked the grand jury investigating the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson to indict Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff I. Lewis “Scooter†Libby and Bush’s Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice, lawyers close to the investigation tell RAW STORY.
Fitzgerald has also asked the jury to indict Libby on a second charge: knowingly outing a covert operative, the lawyers said. They said the prosecutor believes that Libby violated a 1982 law that made it illegal to unmask an undercover CIA agent.
This was added at the end:
Added in revision: “The grand jury had not yet decided on whether to make indictments at the time this article was published. It appears more likely that the jury would hand down indictments of perjury and obstruction than a charge that Plame was outed illegally. “
As I keyboard, a reporter on MSNBC is saying that Fitzgerald left the court a little after 1:00 pm. He presented his recommendations to the grand jury this morning.
More from Raw Story:
Those close to the investigation said Rove was offered a deal Tuesday to plead guilty to perjury for a reduced charge. Rove’s lawyer was told that Fitzgerald would drop an obstruction of justice charge if his client agreed not to contest allegations of perjury, they said.
Rove declined to plead guilty to the reduced charge, the sources said, indicating through his attorney Robert Luskin that he intended to fight the charges. A call placed to Luskin was not returned.
Those familiar with the case said that Libby did not inform Rove that Plame was covert. As a result, Rove may not be charged with a crime in leaking Plame’s identity, even though he spoke with reporters. …
…Rove’s charges appear to stem from allegations that he lied to FBI investigators in 2003, the sources said. Perjury and obstruction charges leveled against Libby center around conflicting testimony to the grand jury, they added.
Oh, gee. Am I going to have to beg for these indictments? On the up side..History has firmly established that America was deceived by Bush and company into the illegal and immoral invasion of Iraq, and that fact is irreversible. To quote a passage from the good book…Mr. Bush,”Your sins have found you out”