William Gaines (professor) - Watergate Informant "uncovered"

Watergate Informant "uncovered"

Gaines led a study with several of his students in 2003 to determine the identity of Watergate informant Deep Throat. Soon after the study, he set up a website, labeled presumptuous and arrogant by some, about the way in which he "uncovered" one of the great enduring mysteries of modern U.S. Politics.

He came to the conclusion that Fred F. Fielding, a former senior partner at Wiley Rein LLP (then Wiley Rein & Fielding), a Washington, D.C. law firm, was Deep Throat. At the time of the Watergate scandal, Fielding was Associate Counsel for President Richard Nixon from 1970 to 1972, where he was the deputy to John Dean during the Watergate scandal.

On May 31, 2005, the actual Deep Throat, W. Mark Felt, acknowledged his identity in an article in Vanity Fair, exonerating Fielding.

On his website, Deep Throat Uncovered, Gaines has written of a confrontation with John Dean about the identity of Deep Throat:

He declined to respond to Smithsonian Magazine. John Dean has been steadfast in arguing Fielding would not have lied to him about being a source for the Post, and Dean bet Professor Gaines $100 that Gaines was wrong. Gaines took the bet.

In an article at the journalism website PoynterOnline, Carl Bernstein has said Gaines' attempt to out Deep Throat was not appropriate: "The last thing students in a journalism class should be doing is trying to find out who other reporters' sources are. They should be learning how to protect sources," and that Gaines "should be spanked."