People v. McKee

Four persons, including Defendant, were charged with six counts of first degree murder in alleged strangling deaths of two men. Respondent, a reporter, wrote articles for news website, containing alleged details of murders. Court granted defense counsel's motion to divest Respondent of his reporter's privilege, seeking materials reporter used and source of materials. Reporter refused to comply with divestiture order and was found in direct criminal and civil contempt. As the identity of reporter's source is not relevant to a fact of consequence to the first degree murder allegations, court erred in granting motion for divestiture. Relevance to collateral matters is not sufficient to satisfy threshold requirement of Section 735 ILCS 5/8-904 (reporters' qualified privilege as to confidentiality of sources) that the sought-after information must be relevant to proceedings in which it is being sought.(LYTTON and SCHMIDT, concurring.)