white house photo

Responding to mounting criticism of the Justice Department’s decision to spy on journalists, President Obama ordered a review of the procedures of investigating reporters, The New York Times reports.

Among the concerns, Obama said, is the potential for the probes to discourage investigative reporting.

“Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs,” Obama said in a wide-ranging address on counterterrorism policy Thursday. “Our focus must be on those who break the law.”

Obama asked Attorney General Eric Holder to review the issue and return with results by July 12.

Steve Neavling

Not much is known about the janitor charged Thursday with sending ricin-laced to a federal judge in Washington state.

According to the Washington Post, Matthew Ryan Buquet is a short, balding 37-year-old and a registered sex offender.

“He sticks to himself,” Scott Ward, who lives across the hall from Buquet’s apartment, told the Washington Post. “He doesn’t talk, really. He’s kind of quiet.”

Buquet became a registered sex offender after being convicted in 1998 of molesting a 10-year-old girl. He also served 18 months in prison.

Steve Neavling

Abdulbaki Todashev says his son loved life in America and would never kill anyone.

His son, Ibragim Todashev, was fatally shot in his Orlando apartment by an FBI agent while being questioned about his ties to Boston bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

“I absolutely refuse to believe my son could have attacked a policeman, to be quite correct, several policemen,” he said Thursday in a telephone interview with The Los Angeles Times Chechnya.

The FBI, he insisted, “killed him for nothing.”

But federal authorities believe Ibragim Todashev may have been involved in a triple shooting with Tsaraev prior to the marathon bombing.

Eric Holder Jr./ticklethewire.com file photo

WASHINGTON -- Attorney General Eric Holder signed off on a controversial search warrant that identified Fox News reporter James Rosen as a “possible co-conspirator” in violations of the Espionage Act and authorized seizure of his private emails, a law enforcement official told NBC News on Thursday.

The disclosure of the attorney general’s role came as President Barack Obama, in a major speech on his counterterrorism policy, said Holder had agreed to review Justice Department guidelines governing investigations that involve journalists.

“I am troubled by the possibility that leak investigations may chill the investigative journalism that holds government accountable,” Obama said. “Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs.”

Rosen, who has not been charged in the case, was nonetheless the target of a search warrant that enabled Justice Department investigators to secretly seize his private emails.

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Ex-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick/official photo

DETROIT — Ex-Detroit Mayor  Kwame Kilpatrick, clad in a tan, khaki prison outfit, entered the federal courtroom in handcuffs and with a smile Thursday morning. He left about 40 minutes later, escorted in handcuffs and with a new court appointed attorney.

Kilpatrick, who was uncuffed during the proceedings, appeared before U.S. District Judge Nancy G. Edmunds to ask to fire attorney James Thomas.

Edmunds agreed and appointed veteran attorney Harold Gurewitz, a former federal prosecutor who had assisted part time in Killpatrick’s defense during trial. Kilpatrick complained that Thomas hadn’t assisted him in motions and hadn’t represented him well during trial.

“I like Harold,” Kilpatrick said, standing at the podium, Gurewitz and Thomas by his side.

It was Kilpatrick’s first court appearance since being convicted March 11 of 24 public corruption and tax counts in one of the sadder Detroit tales in recent years involving a high-profile figure. He’s been in prison in Milan ever since, awaiting sentencing, just like his co-defendant Bobby Ferguson.

His father Bernard Kilpatrick, who was convicted of tax counts in the trial, sat in the gallery. He is the only one of three defendants free pending sentencing.

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Ex-Judge Diane Hathaway

DETROIT – Prosecutors want disgraced ex-Supreme Court Justice Diane Hathaway to serve time behind bars for bank fraud.

In a sentencing memorandum filed Thursday in federal court, the U.S. Attorney’s office recommended that Hathaway serve 12 to 18 months under the sentencing guidelines. Sentencing is set for Tuesday at 2 p.m. in U.S. District Court in Ann Arbor.

“Such a sentence would serve to adequately punish the defendant for her methodical, thoughtful, and sophisticated criminal conduct that spanned over two years and caused approximately $100,000 in losses to a financial institution,” Assistant U.S. Attorneys Daniel L. Lemisch and Patrick Hurford wrote. “In addition, this sentence would deter the defendant and others from future criminal conduct and, in particular, economic crime.”

Hathaway, 58, pleaded guilty in January to a real estate scheme in which she transferred properties out of her name to make it look as if she had less assets, all so she could get a short sale on her Grosse Pointe Park home and get out of $600,000 she owed the bank, ING Direct. The original mortgage was $1.4 million and the home was sold for $800,000 in the short sale.

Under the short sale, the loss to the bank was approximately $100,000, according to the government. The government noted that she did bring $10,000 to the closing for the short sale as a closing fee, bringing the actual loss to $90,000.

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Read sentencing memorandum.