Here is the text of Attorney General Eric Holder’s statement on the murder Sunday of Wichita, Kan., abortion provider Dr. George Tiller, who for nearly two decades has been a target of militant anti-abortion protesters:

STATEMENT OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL ON MURDER OF DOCTOR GEORGE TILLER

        “The murder of Doctor George Tiller is an abhorrent act of violence, and his family is in our thoughts and prayers at this tragic moment.  Federal law enforcement is coordinating with local law enforcement officials in Kansas on the investigation of this crime, and I have directed the United States Marshals Service to offer protection to other appropriate people and facilities around the nation.  The Department of Justice will work to bring the perpetrator of this crime to justice.  As a precautionary measure, we will also take appropriate steps to help prevent any related acts of violence from occurring.�

Lawyers representing Maricopa County Sheriff Joseph M. Arpaio accused Justice Department and Homeland Security officials yesterday of having political motivations in a federal probe of Arpaio, reports the Washington Post.

Arpaio, currently the subject of three federal investigations, is famous for his “unique” treatment methods of prisoners.  The investigations seek to determine if Arpaio’s pursuit of illegal immigrants violated civil rights laws or federal rules.

Robert Driscoll, who served as a civil rights official at the Justice Department early in the Bush administration, said he was seeking “assurances that political rivalries and score settling played no role in the investigations.”

The Arpaio probe began in March, on the heels of calls from Senate Judiciary Democrats for investigations of improper searches and seizures by police officers, including cases involving discrimination.  The investigation was also included in a list of accomplishments by the Justice Department during President Obama’s first 100 days.

Read the full story here.

Former New Jersey U.S Attorney Chris Christie is coming in for a rocky landing in advance of Tuesday’s Republican primary election for governor.

Rudy Giuliani campaigning with Chris Christie

 

Although Christie has a lead in the polls, conservative challenger Steve Lonegan continues to attack the ex-prosecutor’s ethics and mock his endorsement by former presidential candidate Mitt Romney. Christie campaigned on Friday with another failed GOP presidential candidate, ex-New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who’s got his own ethical baggage.

The current fracas: whether a Christie campaign adviser and friend, corporate lawyer John P. Inglesino, received a token job with a New Jersey state senator intended to keep Inglesino on the state payroll, so he would remain eligible for government pension benefits, including life-time health care.

 

The Associated Press reported:

Lonegan released a radio ad Friday criticizing Christie for cronyism and asking Republican voters whether “Christie’s scandals will cost us the election.”

 

The AP also reported that Inglesino attended Seton Hall law school with Christie in the 1980s, and that Inglesino’s law firm, Stern & Kilcullen, was awarded a $3 million no-bid court-monitoring contract while Christie was New Jersey’s U.S. Attorney. Christie has previously been under fire for awarding another no-bid court monitoring contract worth up to $52 million to the firm run by his former boss, ex-Attorney General John Ashcroft. Click here and here for our previous coverage of the Christie-Ashcroft controversy. 

According to the New York Times:

Mr. Lonegan has pushed Mr. Christie farther to the right than he would have liked. Mr. Christie was once a supporter of abortion rights, but now has had to reaffirm — on television — that he opposes abortion, along with same-sex marriage. He ran for the General Assembly in the 1990s saying he favored the state’s ban on assault weapons, but he now tells gun-rights advocates that he wants only to enforce existing laws.

The winner of Tuesday’s Republican primary will face vulnerable incumbent Gov. Jon Corzine (D), whose handling of the economic crisis has caused his popularity to plummet.

UPDATE: Inglesino said he would drop out of the state-supported pension plan that had become controversial, but a pension official said he can’t legally do so unless he quits his job with the Republican state lawmaker.

U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia David Nahmias’s name is before a state judicial nominating commission selecting finalists for a state supreme court vacancy, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Friday.

David Nahmias (gov)

Atlanta native Nahmias is a legal star. He graduated from Harvard Law and is  a former clerk for U.S. Circuit Judge Judge Laurence H. Silberman of the  District of Columbia and Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. He worked several years in the Criminal Division at Main Justice, as a former counsel to Assistant Attorney General Michael Chertoff and later as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the division.

At the Criminal Division, Nahmias supervised the Counterterrorism and Fraud Sections, the Enron Task Force, the Appellate Section and the Capital Case Unit. Read his bio here.

Nahmias, a Bush-holdover who became a U.S. Attorney in 2004, is one of a dozen nominees to replace Georgia Supreme Court Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears, who will leave the bench to join a law firm on June 30, according to The Journal-Constitution. A commission will begin reviewing the nominees on June 4, and make its  recommendations to Gov. Sonny Perdue, who will then fill the vacancy, The Journal-Constitution said.

Sears had been floated as a possible replacement for retiring Justice David Souter on the Supreme Court. President Obama, of course, ultimately gave the nod to Sonia Sotomayor.

Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell called on the Justice Department to file federal charges against two Pennsylvania teens who fatally beat a Mexican immigrant in 2008, The Associated Press reported this afternoon

Brandon Piekarsky was acquitted of ethnic intimidation and third-degree murder by a Schuylkill County, Pa. jury earlier this month, according to The AP. The jury also acquitted Derrick Donchak of ethnic intimidation and aggravated assault, The AP said. The two were only convicted of simple assault, The AP reported.

Rendell called the death of Luis Ramirez “senseless and cowardly,” according to The AP. In a letter sent today, the Pennsylvania governor urged Attorney General Eric Holder to file civil rights charges against the white teens, The AP said.

A national nonprofit that assists sexually abused children with the help of Justice Department grants was cheated out of more than $50,000 by three of its employees, The Associated Press reported this afternoon.

National Children’s Alliance chief financial officer and two of his subordinates stole the money through a series of additional paychecks, according to The AP. The Justice Department has given the nonprofit more than $76 million since 1995, which covers most of its expenses, The AP said.

Former CFO Marvin Perry has been charged with taking $27,114.43 through extra paychecks and is expected to plead guilty, The AP said. Former finance director Sharon Martin pleaded guilty to stealing more than $15,000 through paychecks, The AP reported Former staff accountant Michael Young also pleaded guilty to stealing almost $10,000 through extra paychecks, according to The AP.

Executive Director Teresa Huizar told The AP she wasn’t aware of the thefts until the nonprofit was audited. “It was a very unpleasant surprise,” she told The AP.

“Obviously it’s a terrible thing whenever an employee betrays their employer’s trust,” Huizar told The AP. “What’s particularly horrible about this situation is they stole from an organization that helps victims of child sexual abuse.”

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) came out on National Public Radio yesterday against the recent comments made by conservatives  Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich that Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is a racist.

Here’s what they said:

Gingrich wrote Wednesday on Twitter: “Imagine a judicial nominee said ‘my experience as a white man makes me better than a Latina woman.’ New racism is no better than old racism.”

Limbaugh fired off on his show about Sotomayor’s vote to uphold a Connecticut affirmative action program saying: “So here you have a racist. You might — you might want to soften that, and you might want to say a reverse racist. And the libs, of course, say that minorities cannot be racists because they don’t have the power to implement their racism. Well, those days are gone, because reverse racists certainly do have the power to implement their power. Obama is the greatest living example of a reverse racist, and now he’s appointed one.”

Cornyn — who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee and represents a state with a high Hispanic population — said their comments were “terrible.”

“This is not the kind of tone any of us want to set when it comes to performing our constitutional responsibilities of advise and consent,” he said.

The Texas senator then went on to dismiss the high profile conservatives.

“Neither one of these men are elected Republican officials,” he said. “I just don’t think it’s appropriate. I certainly don’t endorse it. I think it’s wrong.”

The Justice Department will launch a center  that will bring together more than a dozen government groups to fight international crime, Attorney General Eric Holder said today in Rome at the G8 Justice and Home Affairs Ministerial.

The International Organized Crime Intelligence and Operations Center will enable these agencies to meet together and more effectively coordinate international criminal prosecutions, according to a DOJ statement.

“The globalization of criminal networks and advances in technology have made international criminal organizations a significant threat to the safety and security of our nation,� Holder said in the statement.  “But we are answering that threat by developing a 21st century organized crime program that will be nimble and sophisticated enough to combat the danger posed by these criminals for years to come.  [The center] gives us the capacity to collect, synthesize and disseminate information and intelligence from multiple sources to enable federal law enforcement to prioritize and target the individuals and organizations that pose the greatest international organized crime threat to the United States.�

The center will bring together:  the FBI; U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; the Drug Enforcement Administration; Internal Revenue Service; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; the Secret Service; U.S. Postal Inspection Service; Department of State, Bureau of Diplomatic Security; Department of Labor, Office of the Inspector General; the Justice Department, Criminal Division;  the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Treasury Department, Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence.

At the G8 meeting, Holder also highlighted the necessity for collaboration between U.S. and foreign law enforcement, according to the Justice Department.

“He noted that the creation of (the center) demonstrates the United States’ commitment to addressing international organized crime issues and will make the United States a more effective partner for joint investigations and prosecutions,” the DOJ statement said in the statement.

President Bush emerged from relative seclusion yesterday to defend the harsh interrogation methods used against suspected terrorists, The Swamp reported today.

The former president shied away from blasting the anti-terrorism policies of the Obama administration — like former Vice President Dick Cheney has done — but said he did what was right for America and it paid off.

“I made a decision within the law to get information so I can say, ‘I’ve done what it takes to do my duty to protect the American people,’ ” Bush said at the Economic Club of Southwestern Michigan, according to The Swamp. “I can tell you, the information gained saved lives.”

The Department of Justice is disputing a Washington Times report claiming that Obama administration political appointees overruled career Civil Rights Division attorneys in dismissing a voter-intimidation lawsuit against members of the militant Black Panthers. In an editorial, the Times expressed dismay the story hadn’t been “front-page news.” 

In a statement issued by Civil Rights Division spokesman Alejandro Miyar, the DOJ said:

Contrary to the report in the Washington Times, a career attorney in the Civil Rights Division made the final decision to dismiss charges against three of the defendants in this case following a thorough review that determined the facts and the law did not support pursuing the claims in this case

Miyar did not identify the career attorney, but it’s undoubtedly one of the DOJ lawyers listed on the motion to dismiss below (keep reading, scroll down).

The Black Panther incident at a Philadelphia polling station last Nov. 4 had become fodder for Fox News. View their report here:

The Justice Department had already effectively won the case when the defendants failed to contest it. The top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, wrote a letter to the DOJ yesterday protesting the decision to drop the charges.

The DOJ complaint said Malik Zulu Shabazz, Minister King Samir Shabazz, and Jerry Jackson brandished weapons and used “coercion, threats and intimidation” to harass voters, both black and white, at a Philadelphia polling place last Nov. 4.  The defendants wore “military-style uniforms” including black berets and combat boots, the complaint said.

Read the complaint here. 

Grace Chung Becker (gov)

The complaint was signed by Grace Chung Becker, Acting Assistant Attorney General Civil Rights Division; Christopher Coates, chief of the Voting Section; J. Christian Adams, an attorney in the Voting Section. The names of then-Attorney General Michael Mukasey and Robert Popper, deputy chief of the Voting Section, were also on the complaint, though without their signatures.

A 2008 New York Times editorial criticized Becker during her confirmation hearings as having taken “stands that undermine civil rights.” She was never confirmed by the Senate.

Now, Loretta King is the Acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. On May 15, the DOJ moved to dismiss the charges against Jackson and Malik Zulu Shabazz without prejudice, but not against the third defendant, King Samir Shabazz. King’s name was on the motion to dismiss, along with Coates, Popper and Adams. Voting Section attorney Spencer R. Fisher was added.

DOJ spokesman Miyar told the Washington Times the department was “successful in obtaining an injunction that prohibits the defendant who brandished a weapon outside a Philadelphia polling place from doing so again. Claims were dismissed against the other defendants based on a careful assessment of the facts and the law.”

This story was updated from its original version to reflect the Department of Justice’s statement rebutting the Washington Times report.