NYT: NEW info on Rove's poor memory, and changing Plame GJ testimony

In C.I.A. Leak, More Talks With Journalists
By RICHARD W. STEVENSON and DOUGLAS JEHL
Published: December 2, 2005


WASHINGTON, Dec. 1 - A conversation between Karl Rove's lawyer (Robert Luskin) and a journalist for Time magazine (Viveca Novak) led Mr. Rove to change his testimony last year to the grand jury in the C.I.A. leak case, people knowledgeable about the sequence of events said Thursday.

Mr. Rove's lawyer, Robert D. Luskin, spoke in the summer or early fall of 2004 with Viveca Novak, a reporter for Time magazine. In that conversation, Mr. Luskin heard from Ms. Novak that a colleague at Time, Matthew Cooper, might have interviewed Mr. Rove about the undercover C.I.A. officer at the heart of the case, the people said.

Time reported this week that the prosecutor in the case, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, has summoned Ms. Novak to testify about a conversation she had with Mr. Luskin, but provided no explanation of what Mr. Fitzgerald might be looking for. The account provided Thursday by people with knowledge of the discussions between Ms. Novak and Mr. Luskin suggests that Mr. Fitzgerald is still trying to determine whether Mr. Rove was fully forthcoming with investigators and whether he altered his grand jury testimony about his dealings with reporters only after learning that one, Mr. Cooper, might identify him as a source....

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Months before the conversation between Ms. Novak and Mr. Luskin, Mr. Rove testified to the grand jury that he had held a conversation about the C.I.A. officer with only one journalist, Robert D. Novak, the syndicated columnist. Mr. Rove did not disclose that he had also spoken to Mr. Cooper either in his first appearance before the grand jury, in February 2004, or in an earlier interview with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/02/politics/02leak.html?hp&ex=1133499600&en=1012f1a1ce887e6a&ei=5094&partner=homepage

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But Mr. Fitzgerald appears to be evaluating whether Mr. Rove came forward with the information only after it became apparent that Mr. Cooper might be compelled to testify about it. It is not clear precisely what Ms. Novak told Mr. Luskin, or what the context for their conversation had been.

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