Local News in Brief : Court Cites 3 for Releasing FBI Memo
Paul Hoffman, the legal director of the Southern California American Civil Liberties Union, was held in contempt of court Monday in Los Angeles for making public an FBI memorandum linked to the McCarthy-era testimony of a civil rights activist.
Also found in civil contempt of court were Douglas E. Mirell, a private attorney volunteering his services to the ACLU, and their client, Frank Wilkinson.
Wilkinson, 74, filed suit in Atlanta to challenge his 1959 conviction for contempt of Congress after he refused to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. He served nine months of a one-year prison term.
The FBI memo made public by Hoffman, Mirell and Wilkinson said the key witness against Wilkinson, Anita Edith Schneider, who branded him a Communist, was not reliable because she “exhibited emotional instability” in 1955.
The attorneys and Wilkinson disclosed the document at a February news conference.
U.S. District Judge A. Wallace Tashima said the three violated a 1984 order intended to keep such documents secret.
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