posted June 06, 2007 04:32 PM
http://apnews.myway.com//article/20070605/D8PITPN00.html
By MATT APUZZO and PETE YOST
WASHINGTON (AP) - Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison Tuesday for lying and obstructing the CIA leak investigation - the probe that showed a White House obsessed with criticism of its decision to go to war.
I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the highest-ranking White House official sentenced to prison since the Iran-Contra affair, asked for leniency, but a federal judge said he would not reward someone who hindered the investigation into the exposure of a CIA operative. The operative's husband had accused the administration of twisting intelligence to justify the Iraq war.
No date was set immediately for Libby to report to prison.
"Mr. Libby failed to meet the bar. For whatever reason, he got off course," said U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton.
Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who spent years investigating the case, said, "We need to make the statement that the truth matters ever so much." He had asked for a sentence of up to three years, while Libby had asked for probation and no time in prison.
Reaction from the White House was still supportive - but somber.