Regarding the use of Ward Churchill as a source in articles.
After gaining prominence as a writer on ethnic and political issues, Churchill attracted the attention of political and academic critics. His place of teaching later formed a committee to investigate Churchill's work, which found that some of his research methods were flawed and represented misconduct. He sued the school and a jury found he was wrongly terminated, but the judge vacated the jury finding, citing a legal concept that the committee was a quasi-judicial body and therefore legally immune.
The issue then is how to consider Churchill as a source, if the circumstances behind his firing were politicized, and if the vacation of his legal recourse was based in uncommon law (law that itself appears to have circumvented the need for a jury trial in the first place).