According to an August 29 New York Times article, Solomon "returned home from vacation to find a letter dated August 20 from the office of the United States Attorney Mary Jo White of Manhattan, executives with The Associated Press said. The letter informed him that the phone records had been turned over in May.

"This subpoena asked MCI Worldcom to produce the records of incoming and outgoing calls to Solomon's home in northern Virginia from May 2 to May 7."

Associated Press executive editor Jonathan Wolman demanded an explanation from the government for this action. "We know of nothing that comes close to justifying such a gross violation of the editorial process," he said.

This is the first such move by the Justice Department in more than two decades. It ignores 21-year-old internal government guidelines that had virtually eliminated federal subpoenas of reporters' phone records. These guidelines, which are not legally binding, require federal prosecutors to pursue "all reasonable alternative investigative steps" and in most cases to notify in advance the journalist whose records are being sought.

In addition to the subpoena of the AP reporters' phone records, prosecutors pursuing the case against Torricelli have also subpoenaed three bookstores, seeking records of specific customers, said Stephen Rohde, a lawyer for Arundel Books, one of the stores.

This move against the AP reporter comes as the Justice Department has sent Vanessa Leggett, a freelance writer in Texas, to jail for refusing to comply with a federal subpoena ordering her to turn over all copies of her notes and interviews about a murder case under investigation by federal prosecutors. On July 20 a federal judge sentenced Leggett to up to 18 months in jail for contempt of court. A federal appeals court reaffirmed the lower court's decision August 17, refusing to release her from prison.

In an unsigned ruling the court said that even "assuming that Leggett, a virtually unpublished freelance writer, operating without an employer or a contract for publication, qualifies as a journalist under the law, the journalist privilege is ineffectual against a grand jury subpoena, absent evidence of governmental harassment or oppression."

More than a dozen news organizations, including the Associated Press, have filed briefs on Leggett's behalf.

Meanwhile, Congress is set to once again hold hearings on a bill that would criminalize the disclosure of any kind of classified information. A similar bill was approved by Congress last year without a single public hearing but was vetoed by then-president William Clinton. The Democratic president expressed sympathy for the bill's intent, while encouraging legislators to draft a "more narrowly drawn provision."  
 
 
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