ST. LOUIS - Former federal prosecutor Bill Johnston today was sentenced to probation for two years for withholding information in connection with the Branch Davidian siege near Waco, Texas.
U.S. District Judge Charles Shaw also ordered Johnston to perform 200 hours of community service.
"Maybe you need to talk to some high school students," Shaw said. "Maybe you can help somebody not to make a similar mistake."
Johnston, standing before the judge, said: "Whatever my reason, it was wrong. It will never be right to withhold something in fear or panic or whatever reason because that is against the law. This is not what I stood for or what I tried to be, and that is wrong."
Whether Johnston would get probation or jail time remained up in the air prior to Thursday's hearing, despite an earlier agreement reached with prosecutors after Johnston pleaded guilty in February.
Federal prosecutor Jim Martin, assigned to the special counsel's office, said Johnston violated his plea agreement when he made statements to the publication Texas Lawyer after his guilty plea.
In the Feb. 19 issue of Texas Lawyer, Johnston was quoted as saying, "I didn't plead guilty to anything they indicted me for. They charged me with obstruction of justice and five counts of false statements. I did not plead guilty to that and was not guilty of that."
At the hearing, the judge allowed Martin to withdraw his recommendation of probation.
"Bill Johnston's behavior is not atypical of other people that claim to be whistleblowers, often blowing the whistle to cover their own tracks," Martin told reporters afterward.
The case was heard here because special prosecutor John Danforth, assigned by President Clinton to look into possible wrongdoing in the 1993 government siege of the Waco compound, conducted his investigation from his office in downtown St. Louis.
Johnston was convicted of withholding information about the use of pyrotechnic tear gas when the compound burned. Davidian leader David Koresh and some 80 followers died inside.
Johnston set in motion renewed scrutiny of government missteps in the siege by warning then-attorney general Janet Reno in 1999 that she and the public were being misled about the FBI's handling of it.
Johnston admitted withholding one page of pretrial notes related to the 1994 prosecution of several surviving Branch Davidians. He pleaded guilty to one charge of "misprision of a felony," a crime similar to obstruction of justice that carries a lesser penalty. Prosecutors agreed to drop two counts of obstruction of justice and three counts of lying to investigators and a federal grand jury.
The notes included information about the FBI's use of pyrotechnic gas on April 19, 1993, the final day of the 51-day standoff.
Johnston was indicted by a grand jury in St. Louis on Nov. 8, just before Danforth released his final report absolving the government of wrongdoing in the siege.