Wikileaks Wins
Readers of this blog are no doubt aware that the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a motion last week on behalf of POGO to save Wikileaks, the anti-corruption web site that a California federal court ordered to shut down earlier this month. The court had acted at the request of Bank Julius Baer, which argued that the site was posting confidential documents--banking records that allegedly show clients engaging in money laundering and tax evasion. (POGO's earlier posts on this case can be found here and here.)
The court's ruling touched off a firestorm in First Amendment advocacy circles and gave Bank Julius Baer lots of unwanted publicity. Last Friday, after hearing arguments from public interest and media organizations, including the motion filed on behalf of POGO, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White backtracked and lifted the injunction shutting down Wikileaks. (Of course, as POGO noted, the site and the offending documents were always accessible through other means.) Judge White's order is here.
-- Neil Gordon
POGO and Wikileaks are invaluable to American democracy, particularly in the absence of a Fourth Estate (The Press) that is willing to keep a watchful eye, a nosy nose, and a gutsy curiosity aimed at the Big Brothers (Government and Business).
Posted on: Mar 03, 2008 at 07:24 PM