CNN Found Guilty in Airing of Noriega Tapes : Media: The network broadcast private jailhouse talks, which U.S. government had secretly recorded. Court says action defied gag order.

The Cable News Network was found guilty Tuesday of criminal contempt for disregarding a judge’s orders four years ago and broadcasting secretly recorded jailhouse conversations between deposed Panamanian leader Manuel A. Noriega and his lawyers, his children and his mistress.

The broadcasts, over two days in November, 1990, came as the military strongman sat in a federal prison in Miami awaiting trial on drug trafficking and money laundering charges. Noriega was convicted on eight of those charges in April, 1992, and was sentenced to 40 years in prison.

U.S. District Judge William M. Hoeveler, who presided over Noriega’s seven-month trial, said that CNN willfully violated his gag order by broadcasting parts of several government tapes on which Noriega was heard talking in Spanish to an aide in the office of his attorneys, his three daughters in the Dominican Republic and his mistress in Panama. Hoeveler later found that the broadcasts did not infringe on Noriega’s rights.

Nonetheless, in the verdict issued Tuesday, Hoeveler said: “I am ever mindful of an essentially unfettered press and the mandates of the First Amendment, but I must also be mindful of the vital importance of compliance with orders of the court.”

CNN could be fined $100,000. The punishment phase is scheduled for Dec. 9.

In a written statement, CNN spokesman Steve Haworth said that officials of the Atlanta-based network are “disappointed in the court’s ruling.” He added: “We continue to believe that we acted properly. We are reviewing the decision to determine whether to appeal.”

During a four-day trial before Hoeveler in September, CNN lawyers argued that the network was entitled to broadcast the tapes out of a journalistic responsibility to show government misconduct for taping Noriega’s calls. CNN President Tom Johnson testified that he made the decision to defy the judge’s order after conferring with company lawyers and the news staff.

CNN has never disclosed how it obtained the tapes, which were filled with profane and unintelligible talk.

Noriega attorney Jon May said that the CNN conviction has no bearing on Noriega’s appeal of his conviction, since the conversations broadcast had nothing to do with the preparation of his defense and were not prejudicial.

But May added: “Many news organizations accept this as part of the price they have to pay (to uphold rights granted under the First Amendment). But this decision makes it clear that there is a price for disobeying a court order.”

Noriega--who was seized in Panama during a December, 1990, U.S. military invasion and remains confined in a federal prison south of Miami--”is very optimistic” that his conviction will be overturned on appeal, according to May. Oral arguments before the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta are expected early next year.