After denying in June that it was investigating the reporting of deceased Rolling Stone journalist Michael Hastings, the FBI released redacted documents revealing that they had in fact were looking into Hastings’ “controversial reporting” as part of a criminal investigation. The FBI gave the documents to Al Jazeera and a Ph.D student at MIT who had jointly filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit requesting the information. The FBI denied that Hastings had ever been subject of electronic surveillance. (Al Jazeera America, September 9, 2013, by Jason Leopold)
Before his death in a late night car crash in Los Angeles in June, Hastings had told friends that he thought the FBI was after him for a story he was doing about a U.S. soldier captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan and still in captivity. (Infowars.com, September 10, 2013, by Julie Wilson)