Libby to plead innocent, who is Hon. Reggie Walton?

Reuters is reporting that Libby will plead innocent.

This is very good- it means more info and, possibly, other officials having to testify. It may mean other officials having to talk about other officials and that could (hopefully) get messy.

A public trial could expose the role played by Cheney's secretive office in the leak case, which has put a spotlight on how the administration sold the nation on the war in Iraq and aggressively countered its critics.

More importantly, it means that this story will have some legs and the new SCOTUS pick won't be able to bury this too far.

The judge is Reggie Walton and according to the Justice Policy Institute may be, literally, a killer.

...three court appearances as a kid for fighting in what he describes as the "“tough little steel mill towns" dotting the Monongahela River. One of the fights the future-judge was involved in could have resulted in the victim's death, and served as a wake up call, setting him on a course for a stellar legal and political career.

He dismissed a case brought by an FBI agent because it involved too much classified data.

He gave the feds 6 extra months to prepare for trial in Steven Hatfill's defamation lawsuit over its investigation of him in the 2001 anthrax attacks. CNN says it was "with reluctance."

According to Daily Kos, of the Department of Justice leaks defaming Hatfill, Hon. Walton said,

"They're undermining what this country is supposed to be about - that is, that we treat people fairly...If you don't have enough to indict this man, then it's wrong to drag his name through the mud."

"That's not a government I want to be a part of. It's wrong, and you all need to do something about it," he added.

Daily Kos also says he's the judge responsible for stopping USA Next from using a wedding photo of a gay couple to bash the AARP. The personal photo was used without permission and insinuated that the AARP was trying legalize gay marriage instead of saving Social Security.

In a strange twist, AmericaBlog is reporting that the lawyer who represented the gay couple in the photos is now representing Joe & Valerie Wilson in their civil suit against the Bush Administration.