Curiouser and curiouser.
On Monday, National Public Radio reported that the lawyer selected by a federal judge to look into the botched Stevens prosecution, Henry Schuelke III, would not recommend criminal charges against the prosecutors. Now, the Associated Press is reporting that may not be the case.
According to an AP story filed late Tuesday, the Justice Department’s internal watchdog, the Office of Professional Responsibility, has found that two of the prosecutors and an FBI agent committed misconduct.
A draft of OPR’s report says that Assistant U.S. Attorneys Joseph Bottini and James Goeke, and FBI agent Mary Beth Kepner committed misconduct for failing to turn over evidence to Stevens defense, the AP said. The findings are not yet final, and the report clears several other attorneys — including lead prosecutor Brenda K. Morris and former Public Integrity Section chief William Welch — of misconduct allegations.
From here the AP and NPR diverge. Monday’s NPR report said Schuelke had decided against criminal charges and planned to release a report saying as much. But according to the AP story, Schuelke has not yet made a final decision on whether charges are warranted nor has he decided whether to issue a public, written report.
The AP also confirmed that no report has been given to the judge in the case, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan.
VIKTOR BOUT EXTRADITED TO THE UNITED STATES TO STAND TRIAL ON TERRORISM CHARGES
WASHINGTON – After more than two years of legal proceedings, alleged international arms dealer Viktor Bout has been extradited to the Southern District of New York from Thailand to stand trial on terrorism charges, the Justice Department announced today.
Bout arrived this evening on a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) charter plane and was brought to a high-security prison in Manhattan, where he will be held pending trial. Bout, who also goes by many other names, including “Boris,” “Victor Anatoliyevich Bout,” “Victor But,” “Viktor Budd,” “Viktor Butt,” “Viktor Bulakin,” and “Vadim Markovich Aminov,” is scheduled to be presented in Manhattan federal court tomorrow afternoon before U.S. District Judge Shira A. Scheindlin, to whom the case has been assigned.
“Viktor Bout has been indicted in the United States, but his alleged arms trafficking activity and support of armed conflicts in Africa has been a cause of concern around the world. His extradition is a victory for the rule of law worldwide,” Attorney General Eric Holder said. “Long considered one of the world’s most prolific arms traffickers, Mr. Bout will now appear in federal court in Manhattan to answer to charges of conspiring to sell millions of dollars worth of weapons to a terrorist organization for use in trying to kill Americans.”
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said, “Viktor Bout allegedly jumped at the chance to arm narco-terrorists bent on killing Americans with an arsenal of military grade weapons. Today’s successful extradition underscores our commitment to protect Americans on our own soil and throughout the world. The historic operation culminating in today’s extradition would not have been possible without the courageous and groundbreaking work of our partners at the DEA.”
“With Viktor Bout now behind bars in the United States, this defendant will finally face his most feared consequence: accountability for his alleged crimes in a court of law,” said Michele M. Leonhart, Acting Administrator of the DEA. “For more than a decade, Mr. Bout is alleged to have plied a deadly trade in surface-to-air missiles, land mines, bullets, death and destruction. Fortunately, with his arrest, extradition, and pending prosecution in the Southern District of New York, his last alleged attempt to deal in death means that he will finally face justice.”
According to the indictment and other court documents:
Until his arrest in March 2008, Bout was an alleged international weapons trafficker. To carry out his weapons trafficking business, Bout assembled a fleet of cargo airplanes capable of transporting weapons and military equipment to various parts of the world, including Africa, South America and the Middle East. In 2004, as a result of his weapons trafficking activities in Liberia, the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) placed Bout on the Specially Designated Nationals list, which prohibits any transactions between Bout and any U.S. nationals, and freezes any of Bout’s assets that are within the jurisdiction of the United States.
Between November 2007 and March 2008, Bout agreed to sell to the Colombian narco-terrorist organization, the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC), millions of dollars worth of weapons — including surface-to-air missile systems; armor piercing rocket launchers; AK-47 firearms; millions of rounds of ammunition; Russian spare parts for rifles; anti-personnel land mines; C-4 plastic explosives; night-vision equipment; “ultralight” aircraft that could be outfitted with grenade launchers and missiles; and unmanned aerial vehicles.
The FARC is dedicated to the violent overthrow of the democratically-elected government of Colombia and is also the world’s largest supplier of cocaine. Bout agreed to sell the weapons to two confidential sources working with the DEA (the “CSs”), who represented that they were acquiring these weapons for the FARC, with the specific understanding that the weapons were to be used to attack U.S. helicopters in Colombia.
During a covertly-recorded meeting in Thailand on March 6, 2008, Bout stated to the CSs that he could arrange to airdrop the arms to the FARC in Colombia, and offered to sell two cargo planes to the FARC that could be used for arms deliveries. Bout also provided a map of South America, and asked the CSs to show him American radar locations in Colombia.
Bout indicated that he understood that the CSs wanted the arms for use against American personnel in Colombia, and advised that the United States was also his enemy, stating that the FARC’s fight against the United States was also his fight. During the meeting, Bout also offered to provide people to train the FARC in the use of the arms. Following this meeting, Bout was arrested by Thai law enforcement authorities.
The indictment charges Bout with four separate terrorism offenses:
· Count one: conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals,
· Count two: conspiracy to kill U.S. officers or employees,
· Count three: conspiracy to acquire and use an anti-aircraft missile, and
· Count four: conspiracy to provide material support or resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization
If convicted of all counts, Bout faces a mandatory minimum of 25 years in prison and a maximum sentence of life in prison.
This investigation was conducted by the DEA and its success is the result of international law enforcement cooperation efforts spanning the globe. The case is being handled by the Southern District of New York’s Terrorism and International Narcotics Unit. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Anjan Sahni and Brendan R. McGuire are in charge of the prosecution. The Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs and National Security Division, as well as the U.S. State Department, also provided substantial assistance.
The charges contained in the indictment are merely accusations and the defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to vote on a pair of U.S. Attorney nominees at its meeting Thursday.
They are:
Charles M. Oberly III (Drinker Biddle)
-- Charles Oberly (Delaware): The of counsel to Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP was nominated on Sept. 16 to succeed Colm Connolly, who resigned as U.S. Attorney in 2007. Read more about Oberly here.
Ripley Rand (Gov)
– Ripley Rand (Middle District of North Carolina): The North Carolina Superior Court judge was tapped on July 28 to succeed Anna Mills S. Wagoner, who stepped down as U.S. Attorney in August. Read more about him here and here.
The panel will also consider Western District of Arkansas U.S. Attorney nominee William Conner Eldridge Jr. at its meeting.
The committee has yet to schedule votes for another two would-be U.S. Attorneys. The committee has approved 72 of Obama’s U.S. Attorney nominees, all of whom have won Senate confirmation.
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Southern Florida’s new U.S Attorney Wifredo “Will” Ferrer, detailed his office’s priorities in an interview with Sunshine State News Tuesday.
Wifredo Ferrer (DOJ)
Ferrer said he intends to focus on mortgage scams and Medicare fraud, two plagues that have deeply affected Florida in recent months. Ferrer was nominated by President Barack Obama in February and confirmed by the Senate in April.
Ferrer’s Miami-based office has charged 400 people with mortgage fraud schemes totally $500 million. Over the past four years, more than 1,000 people also have faced charges for Medicare fraud involving $3 billion in government funds.
Ferrer said his office has been working to improve cooperation and information-sharing with regulators and banks. To help with this effort, he hired more Assistant U.S. Attorneys to reach out to agents from other agencies.
Ferrer, who replaced R. Alexander Acosta, also expressed his concerns about political corruption. He said he opposed a sentence reductions for three former Palm Beach County commissioners, who were convicted in connection with illegal land deals earlier this summer.
In June, the Supreme Court limited prosecutors’ use of the honest services fraud statute, a measure the Justice Department often used to indict public officials who failed to disclose their personal gains from corporate or government business.
Ferrer said that even with the narrower law, alternative charges would secure the case against the former commissioners.
This post has a clarification.
The Justice Department will not allow key officials involved with the controversial voter-intimidation case against members of the New Black Panther Party to testify before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, protesting the commission’s terms for the depositions, Talking Points Memo reported Tuesday.
Director Joseph Hunt of the DOJ Federal Programs Branch wrote in a letter Monday to commission general counsel David P. Blackwood that the DOJ would not allow testimony from Civil Rights Division staffers after the commission refused to submit to DOJ conditions.
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights subpoenaed former acting Civil Rights Division Assistant Attorney General Loretta King, in addition to division officials Julie Fernandes and Steve Rosenbaum, as part of its investigation into the DOJ’s decision to dismiss most charges against members of the anti-white fringe group. Two members of the group wore military clothing as they stood outside a polling place in a black Philadelphia neighborhood in November 2008.
Hunt wrote in a Nov. 12 letter to Hunt that the department would allow the officials to testify before the commission if the panel would use the DOJ staffers’ testimony to complete its report on the handling of the case and allow the department to review transcripts of the testimony. But the commission cried foul on Monday.
Blackwood said the DOJ is “delaying and smothering” the body’s probe with its conditions.
“It is disheartening that the Department opposes efforts to investigate such allegations and instead has devoted its resources to ’spin control’ and attempting to create a façade of cooperation,” Blackwood wrote Monday in a letter to Hunt. “Such efforts are neither effective nor productive.”
Former DOJ staffer J. Christian Adams and Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher Coates, the former chief of the Civil Rights Division Voting Section, previously testified about aversion in the DOJ to launching voting rights prosecutions against minorities. The DOJ instructed Adams and Coates not to go before the commission.
The panel also subpoenaed Deputy Associate Attorney General Sam Hirsch. But Hunt said in a Nov. 12 letter to the commission that the DOJ will not allow him to testify because he likely has nothing new to disclose beyond confidential DOJ communications.
The commission has spent more than $170,000 investigating the DOJ’s handling of the New Black Panther Party case. Republicans have praised the panel’s probe, sharing several commissioners’ concerns about the DOJ’s decisions in the case.
Earlier this month, the commission tried to vote on a draft report on its investigation. The document alleges the DOJ did not fully cooperate with the probe.
Democratic Commissioner Michael Yaki, who would have made quorum, left the meeting room in protest before the panel could vote on the report. The commission is now slated to vote Friday on the document.
Clarification: an earlier version of this article said the Justice Department had “reversed its decision.” The Justice Department offered to let the staffers testify if the commission agreed to certain conditions, and therefore Hunt’s letter does not represent a reversal of the DOJ’s position.
The former U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of New York will help lead the transition team for New York’s Attorney General-elect Eric Schneiderman, the soon-to-be AG said in a news release.
Zachary W. Carter, who served as U.S. Attorney from 1993 until 1999 and is now a partner at Dorsey & Whitney LLP, is one of three honorary co-chairs who will help recruit candidates to the state Attorney General’s office. The other co-chairs are former New York Attorney General Robert Abrams and Westchester County District Attorney Janet DiFiore. Harlan Levy, a white collar expert and partner at Boies Schiller & Flexner, will lead the transition effort.
“This office confronts an extraordinarily broad array of challenges, ranging from ensuring the integrity of our financial markets to protecting public health. We will do our best to identify attorneys with the diverse skills, experiences and backgrounds necessary to match those challenges,” Carter said in a statement released by Schneiderman’s team. – LN
