U.S. District Judge James Zagel said today he will make public a key document in the Rod Blagojevich case after major news outlets, including the Chicago Sun-Times, objected to its secret filing.
The Santiago Proffer, a prosecution filing that acts as a road map to the government's strategy in the case, will be publicly available Wednesday, Zagel ruled today.
The Sun-Times, Chicago Tribune and Associated Press stepped in and asked for the document to be made public after the government initially filed it under seal.
But there may be some portions of the filing that will not be made public.
Zagel is giving defense lawyers until Monday to suggest portions they want to keep out of public view for now.
He then said the prosecution had 24 hours to respond.
Defense lawyer Sheldon Sorosky said he didn't want the government to file a document that quotes what prosecutors consider their "best tapes." Sorosky said if the document cites portions of the secret FBI recordings, then all the tapes should be released before trial, so the jury pool isn't tainted.
"No one should assume the best tapes are in the Santiago Proffer," Assistant U.S. Attorney Reid Schar said. "The government has other good tapes to play that aren't in the Santiago Proffer."
While there are some new details that haven't been disclosed to the public, the majority of the proffer covers material that's been made public in the past, Schar said.