Two Australian journalists were convicted and fined yesterday for refusing to name a source in a landmark case that has alarmed the country's media.
Herald-Sun newspaper reporters Michael Harvey and Gerard McManus had pleaded guilty to contempt of court for refusing to name the source of a damaging expose of a government plan to cut benefits to war veterans.
The story's publication in 2004 prompted a backbench revolt and the decision to refuse a proposed A$500 million (US$424,000) increase in veterans' entitlements was later overturned.
The Victorian County Court stopped short of jailing Harvey and McManus but they were fined A$7,000 each over their refusal to give evidence at a hearing for an official accused of the leak.
The journalists' union -- the Media, Arts and Entertainment Alliance -- had protested the case, saying that Harvey and McManus were caught up in a government campaign to terrorize whistleblowers.
The case had also attracted the attention of federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock, who called on the Victorian court to take into account recent federal legislation which is designed to protect reporters who refuse to name sources.
Under the law, which Ruddock has urged the states to adopt, federal judges have the power to excuse journalists from revealing confidential informants.
But in his decision, chief judge Michael Rozenes said the legislation did not cover Victoria State and the journalists' professional ethics did not place them above the law.
Regardless of state jurisdiction, Harvey said the case had stemmed from the federal government's decision to ask police to investigate the leaking of the story.
"This was all about a story that we wrote, that was a good story, it was accurate, the [federal] government saw fit to report it to the police for investigation," he said.
"Someone was charged and we got brought into it that way. Essentially we're here for doing our job," he said.
Harvey and McManus had refused to give evidence at the pre-hearing trial of senior public servant Desmond Patrick Kelly.
Kelly was initially convicted by a County Court jury of releasing confidential information to a journalist but this was later quashed by an appeals court on grounds of insufficient evidence.
Speaking after the sentencing, Herald-Sun editor-in-chief Bruce Guthrie said the case underscored the need for law reform on the issue.
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