Louise Story and Gretchen Morgenson have a big A1 piece in the Times today on the SEC’s case against Fabrice Tourre, the relatively junior Goldman trader who has become a lone target of criminal inquiry into Wall Street’s role in the subprime fiasco. There’s not a whole lot new here – by far the most interesting thing is the way the Times reporters got their latest dirt:
These legal replies, which are not public, were provided to The New York Times by Nancy Cohen, an artist and filmmaker in New York also known as Nancy Koan, who says she found the materials in a laptop she had been given by a friend in 2006.
The friend told her he had happened upon the laptop discarded in a garbage area in a downtown apartment building. E-mail messages for Mr. Tourre continued streaming into the device, but Ms. Cohen said she had ignored them until she heard Mr. Tourre’s name in news reports about the S.E.C. case. She then provided the material to The Times. Mr. Tourre’s lawyer did not respond to an inquiry for comment.
Felix Salmon was quick on the draw, asking if the NYT hacked Tourre’s email:
I understand that the computer was found in a garbage area, and that there’s a long tradition of investigative reporters using information found in the trash. But if Tourre left a key to his apartment in the trash, that wouldn’t give reporters the right to use that key to enter his apartment and snoop around. The laptop was essentially a key to Tourre’s email account — which held highly confidential correspondence between Tourre and his lawyers. An email account, these days, is arguably more private than an apartment, and breaking into a password-protected email account is clearly wrong.
How is what the NYT did not hacking into a private email account?
Salmon presents a few possible defenses for the reporters’ behavior, none of which satisfies him entirely. But I have a few more questions:
– Assuming Cohen only handed the laptop to the NYT in early 2010, that means she was monitoring Tourre’s email for at least three and a half years. How did she do that? She left the email program open that entire time – or kept that account active? Or did she somehow gain access to his password? It must have been a local email client (not web-based), or she would have needed to enter the password periodically.
– Why would Cohen continue to snoop on Tourre’s email for this extended period, but then hand it over to the TImes in the end? She’s a struggling documentary filmmaker – couldn’t she have made use of this story on her own?
– Cohen’s last attempt at a film didn’t get the funding it needed. It was called “Deep in the Deal.” Will she try to launch it again now – same name, different script?!
Sources:
“SEC Case Stands Out Because It Stands Alone” Louise Story and Gretchen Morgenson, The New York Times, 5/31/11 https://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/01/business/01prosecute.html
“Did the NYT hack Fabrice Tourre’s email?” Felix Salmon, Reuters 6/1/11 http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/06/01/did-the-nyt-hack-fabrice-tourres-email/
“NYC Producer Persevers to Finalize Funding and Finish Film” Nancy Koan, Daily Kos, 12/10/09 http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/12/10/812520/-NYC-Producer-Perseveres-to-Finalize-Funding-and-Finish-Film
“Deep in the Deal” Project on KickStarter http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1940863937/deep-in-the-deal
