Journalism professor William Gaines and his University of Illinois students believe Deep Throat is Fred Fielding, a lawyer who was first assistant to John Dean, chief counsel to Richard Nixon at the time of the Watergate break-in.
Gaines and his students studied over 16,000 FBI files on microfilm from Watergate, listened to the Nixon tapes and read newspaper stories by Woodward and Bernstein to see which White House officials were named and which were left anonymous. (Daily Illini)
Gaines says of Bob Woodward's promise to name Deep Throat when the source dies: "Does he get up at the funeral and make an announcement or slip it into the obit?"
