The FBI is attempting to again focus public attention on the unsolved 2001 murder of a federal prosecutor in Seattle.

Thomas C. Wales (FBI)

The bureau has published on its website details about the killing of Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Wales, who was shot at his home on Oct. 11, 2001. The FBI noted that the Justice Department has offered a $1 million reward for information that would lead to the arrest and conviction of the shooter. Ticklethewire.com was the first to report on the FBI’s continued interest in the case.

Wales worked in the Western District of Washington U.S. Attorney’s Office from 1983 until his death, handling fraud cases.

Investigators handling his murder case initially focused their attention on a businessman, who was the subject of an unsuccessful prosecution by Wales, but authorities never charged the man.

Scott Kimball, a man convicted of several murders in Colorado, also has come under the scrutiny of investigators. He was in Seattle at the time of the murder and reportedly told the FBI after the murder that he could provide information about the case. But Kimball has denied that he killed Wales.

An attorney who spent years enforcing mine safety laws has retired from the U.S. attorney’s office in Lexington, Ky., the Associated Press reported.

After 20 years of handling civil and criminal cases involving coal mine operators who were accused of violating federal mine safety and health laws, David Sledd retired Friday, the Associated Press reported.

Sledd, an Assistant U.S. Attorney, was hired in 1991 by the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky to handle a backlog of coal mine cases investigated by the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA).

“There are many miners who have never heard of David Sledd but they are safer because of the work he’s done,”  Ricky Hamilton, a former MSHA agent, said in a statement.

Sledd successfully handled cases involving  nearly 150 coal mine operators in the 1990s.

Former Arizona U.S. Attorney Diane Humetewa has been appointed a special adviser to the president of Arizona State University.

Humetewa, who served as U.S. Attorney from 2007 to 2009, will counsel ASU President Michael M. Crow on American Indian matters. She was the first female Native American U.S. Attorney.

At ASU, Humetewa also will lead the university’s Tribal Liaison Advisory Committee, sit on the Provost’s Native American Advisory Council, serve as the school’s legal counsel on American Indian issues and be a law professor.

Humetewa received her undergraduate degree from ASU in 1987 and her law degree from the university in 1993. She has been on the ASU Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law Indian Legal Advisory Committee since 1997.

“Diane Humetewa will provide advice and counsel to ASU on its efforts to design and implement programs and initiatives to better serve Native American students and to partner with Arizona’s Indian tribal governments,â€� Crow said in a statement.

A former FBI agent on Friday was sentenced to two years in prison for plotting to kill his boss, the Associated Press reported.

In December, Carlos Ortiz Jr., pleaded guilty to plotting to kill his boss. In May, Ortiz was suspended without pay by Dallas FBI Special Agent in Charge Robert Casey Jr. after Ortiz’s wife, an analyst in the Dallas FBI office, accused him of domestic violence. Ortiz filed for divorce in 2009 after eight years of marriage.

On Aug. 19 and 20, Ortiz made several phone calls to a former law enforcement officer and licensed firearms dealer, the newspaper reported. During those cases he made threats against his wife and Casey. He also said he was looking for a .50-caliber rifle.

The former officer notified the FBI, which had him record later calls. During those calls, Ortiz threatened to kill his wife and Casey and accused them of an “illicit relationship,” which FBI officials have denied.

On Aug. 25, Casey fired Ortiz and had agents take him into custody. Ortiz, who is scheduled to be sentenced March 18, faces a maximum of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on a charge of retaliating against a federal official.

Harley Lappin will retire as the Justice Department Bureau of Prisons Director on May 7.

Lappin, a career public administrator, has led the agency that has jurisdiction over the federal prison system since April 2003, overseeing more than 100 prisons and the care of about 200,000 inmates. He is the seventh Bureau of Prisons Director since the agency’s creation in 1930.

Harley Lappin (photo by Andrew Ramonas / Main Justice)

The Director has held various administrative posts at the bureau since his start as a case manager at a Texarkana, Texas, federal prison in 1985.  He was warden at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind., when Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh was executed at the facility in 2001.

“I am grateful for Director Lappin’s wise counsel, as well as his dedication to the Justice Department,” Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement. “And I am certain that, for years to come, the Bureau of Prisons and the American people will continue to benefit from his enduring contributions.”

Holder also thanked the Director for his “invaluable insights” on ways to improve inmate rehabilitation and development and tackle prison overcrowding.

Earlier this month, Lappin pleaded with House members for more funding to handle a growing prison population and allow DOJ to use a Thomson, Ill., correctional facility for maximum-security prisoners who are crowding prisons. Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) fiercely opposed the use of the Thomson prison. The chairman of the House Appropriations Commerce, Justice and science subcommittee said he did not trust DOJ assurances that the facility would not house Guantanamo Bay detainees once slated for the prison.

Wolf said the Bureau of Prisons should devote its energy to lowering recidivism through prison work programs and rehabilitation along with working on proposals for early releases.

The New Orleans Police Department must make major changes if it wishes to decrease the city’s homicide rate, which stands at 10 times the national rate, the Justice Department says.

The NOPD should increase its community outreach, establish a homicide review group and improve its crime analysis, according to one of the DOJ Bureau of Justice Assistance reports. The police department also should add more staff to its homicide section and update the unit’s techniques, technology and practices, the second Bureau of Justice Assistance report said.

“Our review convinced us that the primary crime problem in New Orleans is homicide,” the first report says. “Other crimes need to be addressed, but their levels do not suggest a problem that the police and community cannot continue to address with the strategies and practices in place.”

NOPD Superintendent Ronal Serpas has made significant progress on addressing many of the recommendations since he took the reins of the department in May 2010, according to the DOJ. But the DOJ acknowledged that change will not happen over night.

“We realize that in this report we have recommended a formidable agenda for a department that is already facing many challenges,” the first report says. “However, we are optimistic that the department can be successful. It has superb leadership; dedicated personnel who want to make the NOPD better; cooperation from local, state, and federal criminal justice agencies; and growing support from the community. The need is for continuity, time, and resources.”

News of the reports comes just days after the DOJ announced it concluded its year-long civil rights investigation of the NOPD. The DOJ said NOPD officers frequently used excessive force, stopped and searched people without a reason and discriminated against minorities.

A federal judge has dismissed the indictment against Lauren Stevens, former vice president and associate general counsel for GlaxoSmithKline, finding that prosecutors erred in instructing grand jurors who were weighing possible charges that she lied to the Food and Drug Administration.

U.S. District Judge Roger W. Titus of  the District of Maryland ruled on Wednesday that he had to dismiss the indictment because he had “grave doubt” that the jurors’ decision to indict had been untainted by the erroneous instructions.

But the judge said he was convinced that prosecutors had not committed any willful misconduct, and that he was therefore dismissing the indictment without prejudice so that prosecutors can, if they wish, seek “another indictment from a different grand jury that is properly advised.”

The case of Stevens has attracted considerable attention, since it concerns the government’s efforts to regulate the conduct of a huge drug company and illustrates the dangers that in-house lawyers can find themselves in when responding to inquiries by regulatory agencies.

The Justice Department has accused Stevens, who was acting as a liaison between GSK and the FDA, of lying to the agency in connection with GSK’s alleged promotion of the drug Wellbutrin for unapproved, or “off-label,� uses.  She was indicted last fall on four counts of making false statements, one count of obstruction of justice and one count of falsifying and concealing documents.

She has pleaded not guilty to the charges, which state that she withheld data about GSK’s efforts to promote the drug for weight control, and that she falsely told the FDA that doctors who aided in the promotion were not paid for their efforts, when they allegedly were, in fact, paid.

The trial of Stevens was to have begun on April 5 in Greenbelt, Md. Prosecutors had been discussing a possible new trial date before Titus dismissed the indictment, according to Law.Com, which reported on the dismissal.

The errors the judge found in the prosecutors’ instructions had to do with a grand juror’s questions about the “advice of counsel” defense mounted by Stevens, who has contended she acted in good faith, based upon lawyers’ advice, in dealing with the FDA.

Prosecutors told the grand juror the “advice of counsel” defense was something that could be considered at trial, once charges had been filed. On the contrary, the judge ruled. It was something the grand jurors should have considered before deciding whether to indict Stevens at all.

A former federal prosecutor in Detroit was dealt a setback on Thursday in his feud with the Department of Justice as a federal judge threw out his suit alleging that the DOJ leaked information about an ethics investigation involving the prosecutor, thereby violating his privacy rights.

Chief Judge Royce Lamberth of U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Thursday granted the DOJ’s motion for summary judgment against Richard G. Convertino, who has been feuding for years with the department over the botched prosecution of a terrorism case when Convertino was an Assistant U.S. Attorney.

Convertino won convictions against two suspected terrorists in 2003, but the convictions were thrown out over allegations that the prosecution failed to disclose evidence favorable to the defense.  That development in turn prompted an inquiry by the DOJ’s Office of Professional Responsibility into Convertino’s conduct.

The inquiry was later reported by The Detroit Free Press, and Convertino sued the DOJ, contending that it illegally leaked the information. Eventually, the inquiry ended without official findings against Convertino, but the feud was far from over. The DOJ brought criminal charges of obstruction of justice against Convertino, who was acquitted in 2007 (see our earlier coverage.)

In granting the DOJ’s motion for summary judgment, Lamberth said Convertino cannot answer the question on which his case is built and therefore cannot cannot produce evidence that DOJ acted willfully or intentionally, according to the Blog of Legal Times, which reported on the ruling.

“Seven years of litigation have sapped the resources of more than one United States District Court, yet Convertino is no closer to answering the most basic question of all: Who done it?� Lamberth wrote.

Convertino is now in private practice in Plymouth, Mich. He did not immediately respond to a call from Main Justice seeking comment.