Justice asked judge to keep Fox reporter in the dark over tracked e-mail

The Justice Department pleaded with a federal judge to keep a Fox News reporter indefinitely in the dark as it tracked his e-mail in a national security leaks case.

A new set of exhibits unsealed and made public this week show U.S. Attorney Ron Machen argued in 2010 that the traditional 30-day notice period did not apply to Fox News reporter James Rosen. Justice wanted to secretly monitor Rosen’s Gmail account. “Where, as here, the government seeks such contents through a search warrant, no notice to the subscriber or customer of the e-mail account is statutorily required or necessary,” Machen wrote in the June 2010 motion. "Thus, this court's indication on the face of the warrant that delayed notice of 30 days to the customer and subscriber was permissible was unnecessary." Machen, through a separate court order, also successfully stopped Google from telling Rosen that the government was spying on his e-mail account. Machen demanded to see all of Rosen’s e-mail records, including his deleted messages, e-mails in his trash folder and all attachments sent to and from the reporter. The government successfully argued to keep the search warrant under seal for 18 months before making it public in November 2011.