'Scooter' Libby guilty on four of five counts

Story Highlights
• Libby faces 25 years in prison, $1 million fine
• NEW: Libby attorney says appeals planned
• Prison time "virtually certain" if conviction upheld, CNN analyst says
• Vice President Dick Cheney's ex-aide lied about outing of CIA operative


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby has been found guilty on four of five counts in his perjury and obstruction of justice trial.

Libby was convicted of:


obstruction of justice when he intentionally deceived a grand jury investigating the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame;

making a false statement by intentionally lying to FBI agents about a conversation with NBC newsman Tim Russert;

perjury when he lied in court about his conversation with Russert;

a second count of perjury when he lied in court about conversations with other reporters.
Jurors cleared him of a second count of making a false statement relating to a conversation he had with Matt Cooper of Time magazine.

Libby, 56, faces a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison and a fine of $1 million.

CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin said, "He is virtually certain to go to prison if this conviction is upheld."

After the verdict was read, Libby was fingerprinted and released on his own recognizance.

Ted Wells, Libby's defense attorney, said he will file a motion for a new trial, or appeal the conviction if that motion is denied.

"We intend to keep fighting to establish his innocence," Wells said outside the courthouse.

Libby, a former aide to Vice President Dick Cheney, was not accused of exposing Plame. He resigned in 2005 after the grand jury indicted him.

Prosecutors contended Libby disclosed Plame's covert profession to reporters as part of a plan to discredit her husband, Joseph Wilson, a former ambassador who alleged that the Bush administration twisted some intelligence in the run-up to the Iraq war.

Wilson, who conducted a CIA-sponsored trip to Niger, wrote in a July 2003 New York Times editorial that he found no evidence Iraq sought to buy uranium from the African nation, as the administration claimed.

The jury was down to 11 members -- seven women and four men. A week ago, one of the jurors revealed that she had obtained outside information that prompted the judge to disqualify her.

The defense said it would accept 11 jurors to avoid having to start deliberations over with an alternate. The prosecution objected, but U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton overruled, and the panel has continued with one chair empty.

Testimony and evidence in the trial began January 23.

CNN's Kevin Bohn and Paul Courson contributed to this report.