The Justice Department wants to bar the public from a federal district court hearing in D.C. on Jan. 7 in the Blackwater criminal case because the proceeding may result in the disclosure of classified information, reports the Blog of Legal Times. The department’s justification for the request came in a court affidavit filed today.

According to the blog, Justice Department officials “filed a motion Dec. 3 in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia so that the court can determine the use, relevance and admissibility of classified information in the prosecution of five Blackwater security guards, who are charged in the shooting deaths of 17 Iraqi civilians.” Much of the Blackwater litigation has been conducted under seal and in closed courtrooms.

David Kris, assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s National Security Division, said today in an affidavit that the Jan. 7 hearing should be held in camera. Kris was acting on behalf of Holder pursuant to the Classified Information Procedures Act. Kris said his request is based on his knowledge of the evidence and based on discussions he has had with other Justice officials. (Click here for Kris’ affidavit.)

Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez at the National Press Club on Friday (photo by Ryan J. Reilly / Main Justice).

Appearing at the National Press Club on Friday, Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez gave an impassioned speech on his vision for the Civil Rights Division, while criticizing its actions under the George W. Bush administration with the harshest language he has used to date.

“I learned, to my great disappointment, that those who had been entrusted with the keys to the division, and to its great power to pursue justice, treated the division instead like a buffet line at the cafeteria, cherryâ€�picking which laws to enforce,” Perez said in prepared remarks before the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy.

“I’ve seen the eyes and the faces of the wonderful career professionals who toiled during the last eight years, who did their best and did so much, but it was so difficult,” said Perez during his speech.

“I must say I wasn’t surprised by much of the data  [showing fewer civil rights prosecutions in other areas during the Bush administration]. I rather expected it, but I was rather shocked in the hate crimes setting because Ed Meese made hate crimes a priority, Brad Reynolds made hate crimes a priority, John Dunne made hate crimes a priority, George Herbert Walker Bush made the prosecution of hate crimes a priority, Bill Clinton made the prosecution of hate crimes a priority, and Barack Obama and Eric Holder will once again make the prosecution of hate crimes a significant priority,” said Perez.

Touching on his theme of transformation and revitalization of the Civil Rights Division, Perez said that it  must recognize “emerging areas of interest, areas where the Civil Rights Division may not have played a large role historically, but must play a large role today. One essential area is the area of civil rights and human rights, recognizing that we must set an example for the world.”

Perez recounted his testimony before a subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary panel last week on how the Civil Rights Division saw its role in implementing several international human rights treaties. He said the division would be working closely with the State Department on international human rights issues to make sure that the U.S. is in compliance with those treaties.

“We are the nation’s problem-solvers, not simply the nation’s litigators,” said Perez. “I’m a firm believer that if you want a job done well, give it to a busy person, and we’re having a lot of busy people at our department,” said Perez.

The conclusion of Perez’s speech, filmed by Main Justice, can be viewed below. The full speech, as aired on C-SPAN, can be viewed here.

ACS Remarks 12 18 09

Several names are floating around as possible successors to departing Deputy Attorney General David Ogden, the department’s No. 2 official who is returning to WilmerHale in February. We welcome any tips or guidance, which you can send us anonymously here.

The candidates we’ve heard mentioned most frequently are:

• Associate Attorney General Tom Perrelli.Perrelli is said to work well with Attorney General Eric Holder, and is considered a good manager. The intellectual property specialist is well connected, having served as managing editor of the Harvard Law Review in 1990 under Barack Obama, when Obama was president of the prestigious journal. He was counsel to Attorney General Janet Reno in the Clinton administration, also serving as Deputy Assistant Attorney General over the Federal Programs Branch of the Civil Division, where he defended the constitutionality of federal laws. Perrelli raised more than $500,000 for Obama’s presidential campaign and previously was managing partner of law firm Jenner & Block’s Washington office. As the number three official at DOJ, he’s overseen the department’s priority initiative to improve law enforcement in Indian Country.MINUSES: No criminal experience.

• Criminal Division chief Lanny Breuer.Breuer has the political savvy for the job, having earned his battle stripes as a White House counsel defending President Bill Clinton during his 1998 impeachment in the House for perjury and obstruction of justice related to his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. (Clinton was acquitted by the Senate). Breuer is also from Attorney General Eric Holder’s beloved Queens, N.Y., and worked with Holder at Covington & Burling, where Breuer chaired the white-collar defense and investigations practice. Earlier in his career, he was a prosecutor with the Manhattan District Attorney’s office. Breuer won unanimous confirmation from the Senate in April and has been working on a reorganization of the Criminal Division.MINUSES: Breuer’s comment that he wanted a new “rock star” to head the Fraud Section raised some hackles among career prosecutors, who also consider themselves rock stars.

• Civil Division chief Tony West.West was co-chair of Obama’s California finance committee, helping oversee a record haul of $65 million from the state for the presidential campaign. West met Obama at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, where he was a John Kerry delegate and Obama gave the electrifying keynote speech that launched his national political career. West is a graduate of Harvard College and Standford Law School, where he was president of the law review. West worked in the Reno Justice Department as a special assistant to Deputy Attorney General Philip Heymann from 1993 to 1994, and helped shepherd the Omnibus Crime Act of 1994. He was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Northern District of California from 1994 to 1999. He also served in the office of California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, advising on high-tech crime, identity theft, the Microsoft antitrust litigation, police officer training, civil rights, and police misconduct. In 2001 he became a partner with Morrison & Foerster in San Francisco, and later offered pro-bono representation to the “American Taliban” John Walker Lindh. In April he was confirmed by the Senate by a vote of 88 to 4. He’s gotten good marks as a manager over the Civil Division, where’s he’s overseen large recoveries for the government under the False Claims Act.MINUSES: You tell us.

• Former DOJ Inspector General Michael Bromwich.Bromwich is a litigation partner in the Washington office of law firm Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson, where he heads the internal investigations, compliance and monitoring practice group. He served as the Justice Department Inspector General from 1994 to 1999, often clashing with the oversight-resistant Federal Bureau of Investigation. Under his tenure, the IG’s office issued a harsh report on substandard practices in the FBI’s crime laboratory. Bromwich this year was one of three candidates recommended to the White House for District of Columbia U.S. Attorney by Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D). No nominee for the D.C. job has been announced yet. From 1983 to 1987, Bromwich was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York, where he rose to chief of the Narcotics Unit. He was also an associate counsel in the office of Iran-Contract independent counsel Lawrence Walsh from 1987 to 1989.
  MINUSES: Not already part of the DOJ

McLean: I just had an interview with the Board of Immigration Appeals in the Department of Justice, and I am still waiting for the results. I have a question about clearance matters. I also applied to be an FBI special agent, and although I made it through the selection process, I failed the polygraph examination. Do you think this will count against me if I get the BIA position?

Derrick Dortch: I am sorry to hear about the polygraph. The FBI’s polygraph process is a very stressful one, so don’t be too discouraged. Keep on applying to federal positions as you are doing.

Now in terms of the polygraph and the DOJ, it should not be held against you. Most DOJ positions, aside from those in the FBI and a few other areas, do not require you to take a polygraph exam. They usually require only a background investigation and sometimes a security clearance. This all depends on who you are working for. Since you received only a conditional offer of employment and you went through only the initial phase of evaluation, which includes the polygraph, you did not go through a background investigation. When you are asked whether you were denied a clearance, the answer would be no because a security clearance background investigation was barely started and was never completed.

We’re anxious to see whether the questioner got the job. If you’re out there, let us know.

Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) has asked Eric Holder to send one of his critics to prison (government photo).

Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) has written Attorney General Eric Holder asking for an investigation into the woman behind a Web site that criticizes him. The site is called MyCongressmanIsNuts.com.

Grayson accuses the Republican who runs the Web site, Angie Langley, of lying to the Federal Election Commission and complains that while she lives outside of his district, Langley still uses the term “my� in “mycongressmanisnuts.com.�

“Ms. Langley has deliberately masqueraded as a constituent of mine, in order to try to create the false appearance that she speaks for constituents who don’t support me,� writes Grayson. “[She] has chosen a name for her committee that is utterly tasteless and juvenile.�

Because she has been dishonest about who her representative is, writes Grayson, “Ms. Langley and the [MyCongressmanIsNuts.com] Committee should be fined, and Ms. Langley imprisoned for five years.”

The letter from Grayson to Holder, obtained by Politico, is embedded below.

Earlier this week we wondered whether Eric Holder uses an iPhone, a BlackBerry or a Motorola Razr, our interest piqued by a White House photo showing a basketful of devices collected from administration officials before they meet with President Barack Obama.

(screenshot from White House video)

We now have an answer.

“All three!” Holder told us at the Department of Justice’s holiday party Thursday night.

We asked, and received, permission from the Attorney General to report this bit of probably useless news.

A former U.S. Attorney from the George W. Bush administration is considering running for the Republican nomination to challenge Rep. Chris Carney (D) in 2010, Congressional Quarterly reported today.

Tom Marino, who led the Middle District of Pennsylvania U.S. Attorney’s Office from 2002 to 2007, met with National Republican Congressional Committee members today in Washington about a possible run for the 10th district House seat in northeastern Pennsylvania, according to CQ. Republican leaders previously tried to get Marino to run in 2008, CQ said.

The NRCC is still meeting with other potential candidates for the seat, including Republican state Rep. Mike Peifer, according to CQ.

Carney is serving his second term in Congress. The Democrat unseated Rep. Don Sherwood (R-Pa.) in 2006 and won reelection by a 12 percent margin in 2008. But both Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Bush carried Carney’s district in the last two presidential elections.

CQ said Carney will likely win reelection.

The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia got a little choked up during his ceremonial swearing-in before almost 200 well-wishers at a federal courthouse today, The Augusta Chronicle reported.

Ed Tarver (gov)

Ed Tarver blinked back tears when he spoke about his former job at the Hull, Towill, Norman, Barrett & Salley law firm in Augusta, Ga., according to the newspaper. He worked there for almost 20 years.

“They have been more than my law partners, they are my family and have helped us a great deal,â€� Tarver, the first African-American to serve as U.S. Attorney in Georgia’s southern district, said at the ceremony, according to the Chronicle.

Augusta businessman James L. Kendrick said in his remarks at the ceremony that Tarver can be proud of his past work at the Augusta law firm and his U.S. Attorney appointment.

“Ed Tarver, you have earned the right to feel proud, honored, blessed and maybe a little loved,â€� Kendrick said, according to the newspaper.

Tarver was officially sworn in last month, shortly after his Senate confirmation. He succeeded former U.S. Attorney Edmund A. Booth Jr., who resigned in September.

A Middle District of Georgia judge rebuked prosecutors in the Macon-based U.S. Attorney’s Office this week for their failed prosecution of a prominent local lawyer.

In their “relentless pursuit” of Columbus, Ga., lawyer Mark Shelnutt, the Middle District of Georgia U.S. Attorney’s Office likely worked out a “sweetheart deal” with members of an alleged drug ring to gain their cooperation, U.S. District Court Judge Clay Land wrote in a Dec. 14 court order.

“[T]he Court had concerns that the judgment of the U.S. Attorney’s Office may have become clouded by its zeal to bring down a prominent criminal defense attorney,” Land wrote in the order.

Shelnutt represented the alleged drug ring leader, Torrance Hill, who was sentenced in 2007 to 24 years in prison on drug charges. The government later charged Shelnutt in a 40-count indictment alleging money laundering and other offenses. But prosecutors dropped three counts at trial, while a jury acquitted Shelnutt of the remaining charges.

The judge wrote in the order that one of the purported sweetheart deals apparently involved Shawn Bunkley, described by the judge as a “major participant in one of the city’s largest drug conspiracies.” Prosecutors had recommended a sentence of less than 37 months for Bunkley because of his cooperation in the investigation. Land called the proposed sentence “astonishing.” Last week, Bunkley was sentenced to 10 years in prison on drug charges, according to the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer.

Land said he became especially concerned about potential prosecutorial misconduct after an Assistant U.S. Attorney said he’d lied about about an incident in which he attempted to make a secret recording of a Shelnutt.

Prosecutor Jason Ferguson, who is based at the Albany, Ga., branch of the U.S. Attorney’s office, said during a court hearing that he didn’t admit he was wearing a wire in an interview with Shelnutt, even though Shelnutt asked whether he was being recorded. The Assistant U.S. Attorney said he thought he gained approval from his supervisors to make a secret recording, according to court documents.

“The Court was particularly struck by the zeal with which the U.S. Attorney’s Office pursued Shelnutt and the Court became concerned when it learned of information suggesting that the U.S. Attorney’s Office had crossed the line from independent prosecutor to law enforcement,” Land wrote in the order.

Middle District acting U.S. Attorney G. F. Pete Peterman III declined to comment to Main Justice, citing office policy that generally prohibits commenting on court orders. Peterman took over the office from Frank Maxwell Wood, a George W. Bush appointee who resigned last summer to run for Georgia attorney general.

Wood, who led the office at the early stages of the drug ring prosecutions, told Main Justice that Land’s comments were “very uncalled for.” He said Land lacks the prosecutorial experience necessary to properly comment on how the U.S. Attorney’s office handles its cases. Land spent 16 years in private practice in Columbus, Ga., before he joined the court in the first year of the Bush administration.

“We do what we think is right,” Wood told Main Justice. “But, we don’t work for the judge.”

Land did not name Ferguson or any of the prosecutors involved with the cases in the order.

“The Court derives no satisfaction in its criticism of the U.S. Attorney’s Office,” Land wrote in a footnote in the order. He added, “The Court also does not seek to publicly embarrass any of these public servants.”

John Kopchinski, the man who blew the whistle on pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc., was named the most influential person in business ethics in 2009 by the think tank Ethisphere. (h/t UPI)

Kopchinski, a former Pfizer sales representative, waged a six-year legal battle against the company, exposing massive marketing transgressions that would lead to a record criminal penalty ($1.2 billion) and the largest-ever civil penalty ($1 billion) against a pharmaceutical company.

For his part, Kopchinski earned $52 million under the False Claims Act’s qui tam provision. Ethisphere, which is well-known for its annual ”World’s Most Ethical Companies” rankings, recognized Kopchinski for turning “whistleblowing into big business.”

He topped the list of 100 honorees — which also includes Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer and Assistant Attorney General Christine Varney. Breuer (No. 12) and Varney (No. 25) were commended for their leadership of the Criminal and Antitrust divisions, respectively.

Other winners included President Barack Obama and Pope Benedict XVI. Click here for the full list.