The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights spent $173,653 in its investigation into the Justice Department’s handling of a controversial voter intimidation case against members of the New Black Panther Party, Talking Points Memo reported Monday.

The commission held several hearings over the last year regarding the DOJ’s decision to dismiss most of the charges against members of the anti-white fringe group who stood outside a majority-black polling place wearing military clothing in November 2008. The hearings included testimony this year from key DOJ officials including Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, former DOJ prosecutor J. Christian Adams and Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher Coates, the former chief of the Civil Rights Division Voting Section.

Perez defended the decision made in the case during his testimony before the commission. But Coates, who testified against DOJ orders, and Adams blasted the handling of the case.

The commission will meet Friday to approve its New Black Panther enforcement report, which is expected to be critical of the DOJ, according to TPM. The investigation has been applauded by Republicans, who have expressed concern about the DOJ’s decisions in the case.

A Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives special agent facing controversial murder charges in the Virgin Islands will face a new judge when his trial starts Monday, the Associated Press reported.

William G. Clark (Provided)

Virgin Islands Superior Court Judge Brenda Hollar recused herself from the case against William G. Clark, who shot and killed a neighbor in the U.S. Caribbean territory.  Judge Edgar Ross will now handle the case.

Lawyers for Clark, who says the killing was in self-defense, filed court documents earlier this month asking for a new judge. The lawyers claimed that a member of the ATF agent’s legal team was unable to listen in on a 30-minute conversation between Hollar and a prosecutor handling the case, according to the AP.

Mark E. Schamel, a partner at the law firm of Womble, Carlyle, Sandridge & Rice PLLC in D.C., and former Virgin Islands Attorney General Kerry Drue are representing Clark.

They have argued that the ATF agent was improperly charged in territorial court. Clark’s lawyers also argued that charges should be filed in federal court because the ATF agent was acting within his capacity as a federal law enforcement official at the time of the shooting. The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution requires state court judges to uphold federal laws even if they conflict with the state laws.

Hollar ruled in March that the Supremacy Clause does not apply to the Virgin Islands. Chief Judge Curtis Gomez of the U.S. District Court of the Virgin Islands also ruled against Clark, saying there was not enough evidence to suggest the ATF agent was acting as a federal law enforcement official at the time of the shooting.

The Clark legal team asked the judges to reconsider their positions. But the judges did not change their rulings.

The ATF agent’s lawyers earlier this month lost their appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit, allowing the trial to proceed in territorial court.

The case against Clark has sparked outrage from members of Congress and the federal law enforcement community.

ATF Deputy Director Kenneth Melson, who has led the agency since April 2009, made a brief appearance before the start of a rally in D.C. in support of an ATF special agent. Melson has told ATF agents that he is “taking all possible actions to support Will.”

The agency has cleared Clark of wrongdoing after an internal inquiry into the 2008 shooting of Marcus Sukow. Clark shot Sukow during a domestic dispute between the man and his girlfriend. (Read our four-part series on the case here.)

Clark on Friday attended a pretrial hearing in the Virgin Islands on his case, according to the AP. The trial is slated to include testimony from high-ranking officials in the territory, including Gov. John P. deJongh.

Attorney General Vincent Frazer said the Clark prosecution is fair.

“No one is above the law,” Frazer told the AP. “The decision to proceed with the prosecution of William Clark was a legal decision based on the facts and a thorough investigation.”

Documents released this week show the FBI first took an interest in the late Sen. Paul Wellstone when he was a 25-year-old war protester.

A former Attorney General will be a top speaker at a national conference for a socialist political party in the United States, the group announced Sunday.

Ramsey Clark (IndictBushNow.org)

Ramsey Clark, who served in the Lyndon Johnson administration, will host a Party for Socialism and Liberation ceremony in Los Angeles next month honoring “radical lawyers,” political prisoners and socialist activists, according to the Marxist-Leninist group.

Clark, who rallied against the Vietnam War, founded the self-described “anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist” International Action Center, an anti-war organization, and IndictBushNow.org, which calls for the prosecution of former President George W. Bush for alleged war crimes. The former Attorney General also helped represent former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein after his 2003 capture and offered legal help to Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, who was indicted in 1999 on war crimes charges during the Kosovo War.

The November socialist gathering is the second conference for the party that “promote[s] the movement for revolutionary change,” according to the group’s website. The party is backing candidates this year for governor, secretary of state and congress representatives in California.

“The National Conference on Socialism hosted by the PSL will be a truly historic event in the socialist movement,” wrote Doug Kaufmann in the party’s announcement of the conference. “The PSL will continue to organize for the upcoming conference and hopes to connect with hundreds of workers and students from throughout the country who are ready to stand up and fight back. There is no better time for socialism than right now!”

The Montana U.S. Attorneys office has created a new unit to focus on Indian Country crime, The Great Falls Tribune reported.

The unit will have six prosecutors, with Assistant U.S Attorney Lori A. Harper Suek from Billings, a veteran Indian Country prosecutor, as its head.

The other members of the team will be Vince Carroll, Jessica Betley and Laura Weiss, all of Great Falls, Danna Jackson and Mike Wolfe from Helena.

Last week, Montana U.S. Attorney Michael Cotter announced that the new unit would help prosecute crime on American Indian reservations.

Friends and former colleagues share memories of former U.S. Attorney Jim Neal.

A former prosecutor urges the Texas senators to end their blockade of the state’s U.S. Attorney picks.

The editorial board says the DOJ Antitrust Division should approve the merger.