Was it legal to publish Sanford's emails?

On June 24, last Wednesday afternoon at 2:30, South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford held a State House press conference. As he phrased it, he put his cards on the table and let the "chips fall where they may." They're still falling.

Just this Tuesday afternoon, June 30, South Carolina Attorney General Henry McMaster said he needed SLED to look into the governor's travel expenses to search for possible public money on private trips. Sanford disclosed earlier in the day he had unofficially arranged unaccounted encounters in New York City, both innocent and romantic on different trips to meet the same woman.

Before McMaster, S.C. Senator Jake Knotts (R- Lexington) last Friday called for an investigation immediately following the governor's cabinet meeting and impromptu press conference on the State House westside steps.

At both the capitol steps and senator's press conference that Friday afternoon, I asked loud enough for the entire attending population to hear, "Is it legal to publish stolen letters?" Neither the governor nor the senator gave the question a direct answer.

So, just what is the deal here?

Senator Knotts was asked if he could call for not only an investigation seeking disclosure of public funds for private trips, but could he call for an investigation into how Sanford's letters came to the newsroom at The State newspaper.

In the Thursday, June 25 issue of The State, Sanford's correspondence with his Argentine lady friend, later identified as Maria Belen Chapur, was published, taking up the entire A- 5 page and leaving no room for advertising, a questionable business practice but maybe an even more questionable legal practice.

Chapur, who has been getting curiously favorable

coverage from The State,

reported in the past week her Sanford file was the target of a hacker, someone who stole her written correspondence with Sanford

and forwarded it to The

State.

The State is part of McClatchy Newspapers, too big and too cautious to flout privacy laws. But how else did the letters come to Columbia?

Did The State hear the go- ahead from one of the two letter writers, Sanford or Chapur? Can the origin of

The State's Sanford letters be identified and confirmed?

As I asked Sanford last Friday afternoon outside Sanford's office, "Does the governor have the right to any privacy? Do I have a right to privacy?"

Is it legal to publish stolen letters?