The Massachusetts U.S. Attorney’s office will have a dedicated team to fight hate crimes, U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz announced Tuesday.

Carmen Ortiz (DOJ)

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Theodore Merritt of the Public Corruption and Special Prosecutions Unit and Sonya Rao of the Civil Division will lead the Civil Rights Enforcement Team as it handles civil rights cases and works with law enforcement agencies to combat hate crimes.

“Vigorously enforcing federal civil rights laws is a top priority,â€� Ortiz said in a statement. “The Civil Rights Enforcement Team will ensure a level playing field, advancing equal opportunity and protecting the rights of Massachusetts residents. Its primary mission is to restore a fair and aggressive philosophy towards enforcement, ensuring that our most critical and treasured laws continue to fulfill their purpose.”

Read more about the team here.

A fourth member of the New Orleans Police Department was charged Friday in connection with a fatal shooting in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Officer Robert Barrios was charged in a one-count bill of information filed in federal court in New Orleans. Barrios is charged with conspiring with other New Orleans police officers to obstruct justice by covering up the details of a police shooting incident.

A bill of information, rather than a grand jury indictment, often signals that the defendant is cooperating with the government and will plead guilty.

According to the court filing — based on investigations by the FBI and the Department of Justice — Barrios and other officers encountered a number of people walking across the Danziger Bridge on Sept. 4, 2005 — about a week after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. According to the information, officers fired at the civilians, killing two and injuring four.

The Department of Justice Civil Rights Division is considering a civil rights lawsuit against the New Orleans Police Department, the blog Talking Points Memo reported Tuesday.

“Criminal prosecutions alone, I have learned, are not enough to change the culture of a police department,” Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez told TPM.  He added that the division was considering “every conceivable jurisdictional option and every conceivable intervention.”

“The attorney general, myself, the U.S. attorney — we will not leave the New Orleans Police Department until we have addressed the systemic issues and have ensured that the department is operating in a manner that reduces crime and respects the rule of law,” Perez said. “We can, must, and will do both.”

The Department of Justice currently has at least eight open civil rights investigations into the New Orleans Police Department, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune. Since 2008, the Justice Department has been investigating a post-Hurricane Katrina shooting in which New Orleans police officers allegedly shot at unarmed civilians in the wake of the 2005 hurricane that devastated the city.  Three officers so far have pleaded guilty to involvement in the shooting at the Danziger Bridge in New Orleans or in the subsequent cover-up.

Perez visited the city in March for an update on the investigation. During that visit, Perez called the New Orleans Police Department “profoundly troubled.”

“One observation that’s inescapable is that the department has a litany of very, very serious challenges,� Perez told The Associated Press. “There are not quick fixes to transforming a culture,� he said. “Culture change takes time. Culture change takes perseverance. There’s no quick fix to that, but it can be done. I’ve seen that in other departments.�

According to TPM, the Civil Rights Division could bring a civil rights lawsuit under a 1991 law passed in the wake of the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles. If the Justice Department could prove a “pattern or practice” of disregarding the law or constitutional rights, it could seek a consent decree that would allow it to step in and institute changes. In 2000, the DOJ reached a similar deal with the city of Los Angeles.

The FBI is ready to close nearly 100 unsolved civil rights-era killings three years after the agency pledged to investigate the cases, The Washington Post reported Sunday. Investigators told the paper few indictments will be issued because of the deaths of prime suspects and the difficulty of gathering decades-old evidence.

Race did not play a role in nearly one-fifth of the 108 cases, according to the paper. In some cases the people died in accidents, non-racially motivated fights or in circumstances family members did not want made public.

FBI Special Agent Cynthia Deitle, head of the effort, told The Post that with the exception of a dozen or so cases that bureau knows who committed the crime. “Some we know; others we know but can’t prove. For every other case, we got it,” Deitle said.

Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez told The Post, “These racially motivated murders are some of the greatest blemishes on our nation’s history,”adding, . . . . If we can solve a number of these cases, that’s fantastic. But if we can bring to closure all of these cases, I think this will be well worth the effort.”

Tthe investigation has helped close information gaps and provide victim’s families with some closure, FBI investigators working on the project said. According to The Post, family members and victims’ rights advocates have long complained about how long it has taken for the federal government to investigate the unsolved crimes.

Civil rights activist Rev. Al Sharpton rebuked Attorney General Eric Holder for the Justice Department’s decision today to abandon an investigation of three New York City Police Department officers involved in the fatal shooting of an unarmed man.

Al Sharption (National Action Network)

The DOJ said in a news release there was “insufficient evidence” to pursue civil rights charges against the detectives who shot and killed Sean Bell and wounded his friends, Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield, outside of a strip club on Bell’s wedding day in 2006.

Detectives Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora and Marc Cooper shot at Bell and his friends 50 times after reportedly overhearing remarks that led them to believe the men were going to commit violence. The police officers were acquitted by a state judge of all charges stemming from the shooting, which ignited community outrage.

“I expressed to [Holder] my extreme disappointment in the decision and our legal advisors saw the evidence and federal jurisdiction differently,” Sharpton said in a posting on Facebook after he spoke with the Attorney General. “We agreed, however, that the family and community must continue to bring a new day in how we deal with police matters and how both community residents and police are protected equally under the law.”

The DOJ made the decision after a “comprehensive independent investigation” involving the FBI, the DOJ Civil Rights Division and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York, according to the DOJ news release. U.S. Attorney Benton Campbell met with Bell’s family Tuesday to deliver the news, according to the Associated Press.

Sharpton said he will continue to help Bell’s family and friends in their efforts to fight the decisions made in their case.

“Even though two of the three officers in question were Black we will not stop our pursuit of justice in this matter until every measure in the criminal and civil arena has been exhausted,” Sharpton said. “Fifty shots on an unarmed man who engaged in no crime is intolerable.” Bell was also black.

The New York Observer first reported Sharpton’s Facebook posting.

When President Barack Obama signed sweeping hate crimes legislation into law at a ceremony last month, new Northern District of Ohio U.S. Attorney Steven Dettelbach was there – a sign of the Cleveland prosecutor’s rising influence in civil rights enforcement.

Northern District of Ohio U.S. Attorney Steven Dettelbach speaks at his swearing in ceremony on Oct. 26. (DOJ)

Dettelbach, who was confirmed by the Senate in September, is the new chair of the civil rights subcommittee of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee of U.S. Attorneys.

The AGAC advises Attorney General Eric Holder on policy and law enforcement issues. And civil rights is a top priority of the Obama administration.

At his Oct. 26 investiture ceremony, Dettelbach made clear his commitment to enforcing anti-discrimination laws by invoking Tom Perez, the new Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division.

“We can and must follow Tom Perez’s example of relentless dedication to civil rights, because our citizens must understand that the laws we enforce apply equally to all, not just some,” he said in prepared remarks.

Dettelbach has a long history working on civil rights issues. He successfully prosecuted several civil rights cases during his almost two decades as a federal prosecutor at U.S. Attorney’s offices in Cleveland and Maryland and at  Justice Department headquarters in Washington.

He told Main Justice in a recent interview that among his office’s “usual assortment of prosecutorial plaques and knickknacks� are two awards from former Attorney General Janet Reno that he received when he was an attorney in the DOJ Civil Rights Division.

One plaque honors Dettelbach’s work on a case that involved an Indian woman who was brought to Miami as a slave. She endured regular beatings over the course of seven months and was even branded with an iron, according to Dettelbach.

Another award commemorates the prosecution of Ku Klux Klan members who tried to undermine the integration of housing projects in Vidor, Texas.

“He is deeply committed to fighting for crime victims and to holding those who commit crimes, even the most powerful, accountable,� said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division Mythili Raman, who worked with Dettelbach in the Maryland U.S. Attorney’s Office.

But Dettelbach’s experience extends beyond civil rights cases.

He was a part of the organized crime and corruption strike force during his time as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Cleveland. As deputy chief of the Greenbelt branch of the Maryland U.S. Attorney’s Office, he prosecuted fraud cases. Dettelbach also worked as a Senate Judiciary Committee counsel to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and most recently as a partner in the Cleveland office of law firm Baker & Hostetler.

“He brings a good, well-rounded experience to the table,� said former Deputy Attorney General Craig Morford, who once supervised Dettelbach in the Cleveland U.S. Attorney’s office.

Dettelbach said while his diverse experience has prepared him to be U.S. Attorney, the job presents new challenges.

“There is no typical day,� Dettelbach said. “That’s what makes the job both so rewarding and so challenging. On any day, you are doing a mixture of managing the cases and the investigations that the assistants and agents are doing in the office, representing the office in the community and representing the office within the Department of Justice as a whole.�

The U.S. Attorney said taking over the reins of the Northern District office is “like getting on a train that going 100 miles per hour.�

“Even though I had worked here as an Assistant, it’s a much different perspective being the U.S. Attorney than it is being an Assistant,� he said.

His office is working a number of major prosecutions including a corruption scandal in Cuyahoga County and a civil rights case involving a white supremacist who mailed a noose to an Ohio chapter of the NAACP.

Dettelbach said terrorism will remain his office’s top priority, even as he puts a renewed focus on civil rights enforcement and financial fraud.

The U.S. Attorney said he is meeting with all of the office’s Assistant U.S. Attorneys to discuss his plans and hear their suggestions.

Dettelbach said his new responsibilities have cut into his personal time with his wife and two children. He works a lot and is “not allowed to talk to my wife about it,â€� he said.

But long hours are nothing new for Dettelbach, said Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein. Dettelbach often worked nights and weekends as the deputy chief of the Greenbelt branch office, he recalled.

“He is a guy who really enjoys working for DOJ,� Rosenstein said.

Dettelbach said his work as a federal prosecutor has “made me the happiest.�

“I have to say one of the great things about this job is you can even explain to a four- and six-year-old the importance of what we do. And that to me is a great thing that Assistant U.S. Attorneys get to do and U.S. Attorneys get to do,� Dettelbach said. “Even at the most basic level, people can understand what you’re doing is something that is important in your community.�

This post has been corrected from an earlier version.

Steven Dettelbach (ohio.gov)

Steven Dettelbach, who was sworn in Monday as Northern Ohio’s new U.S. attorney, says he will put a renewed focus on civil rights enforcement and financial fraud.

“After 9/11, we had to divert a lot of resources to anti-terrorism activities and we need to continue to do that,” Dettelbach said in an interview with WKYC-TV. ”We need to re-focus our efforts on things like fighting economic crime, because people in the community need to understand that a free market also has to be a fair market.”

Dettelbach was one of six U.S. attorneys confirmed by unanimous consent on Sept. 15.  He was sworn in at the Martin Luther King Jr. High School in Cleveland today. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) administered the oath of office.

Dettelbach jointed the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division in 1992 as a trial lawyer. He was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Cleveland assigned to the Organized Crime and Corruption Task Force from 2003 until he left for private practice in 2006. Before his selection as U.S. Attorney, Dettelbach was a partner at Baker & Hostetler, splitting time between the firm’s Washington and Cleveland offices.

In another interview, Dettelbach said that that fighting terrorism would remain his top focus, but he would devote resources to other problems as well.

“We have to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time…we have to keep the level of protection against terrorism at the same place it’s been and, at the same time, we have to get back to the bread-and-butter work of federal investigators because threats don’t just come from terrorists,” said Dettelbach.

Dettelbach’s office is currently prosescuting a huge corruption scandal in Cuyahoga County and a civil rights case involving a white supremacist who mailed a noose to an Ohio chapter of the NAACP.

Slate Magazine Senior Legal Correspondent Dahlia Lithwick (By Steve Bagley for Main Justice)

Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee’s Constitution and civil rights subcommittee said Thursday the conservative wing of the Supreme Court was acting against the cause of civil rights.

Committee members said the point of their hearing yesterday was not to criticize the Supreme Court, but to discern how to legislate in the face of what they characterized as an agenda against civil rights. “We could be blasting the hell out of the court system,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) said, “because they’ve sure done some pretty lousy work, not just recently, but historically.”

One of two Republicans to attend the hearing, ranking minority member Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (Wis.) took an opposing view, noting Supreme Court refused to “strike down” the Voting Rights Act of 1965 when it was up for renewal in 2006.

Conyers was unmoved. He mentioned three Supreme Court decisions from the past several years, including Alexander v. Sandoval, Gross V. FBL Financial Services, and Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tires.

In Ledbetter, Conyers noted, Judge Ruth Bader Ginsberg read her dissenting opinion aloud in court, calling the majority decision a “cramped interpretation” that was “incompatible with the statute’s broad remedial purpose.” Congress changed the law, in effect over ruling the court, when it passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009. President Obama signed it into law in one of his first official acts as president.

Noting these precedents, subcommittee chair Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) said Congress needed to continue to examine how Supreme Court decisions effect civil rights. “Calling balls and strikes is the job of umpires,  but the Justices have a more complicated tasks,” Nadler said.

Those decisions, Nadler and panelists said, slowly chip away at civil rights. One panelist, Charlestown School of Law Prof. Armand Derfner, said he believes the laws have been misinterpreted by the courts.

“Today’s Supreme Court takes a very different approach to interpreting Congress’ laws,” Derfner said. “Fifteen cases the Supreme Court has decided, Congress has had to correct. It’s astonishing to have a record like that.”

Prof. Aderson Francois of Howard University School of Law took a more measured approach. He told the committee in his written testimony that “while the Court has certainly issued its share of decisions that can be fairly characterized as hostile to the advancement of civil rights and equality, it is probably premature to conclude that the Court has been – or will be – consistently anti-civil rights.”

Francois added that the tenure of Chief Justice John Roberts has not been a major change from that of the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, another conservative. But “given the Supreme Court’s poor record in matters of civil rights over the last 20 years, the continuation of the Rehnquist Court jurisprudence under Justice Roberts has indeed left civil rights enforcement in a fragile and precarious position,” he said.

Rep. Frank Johnson (D-Ga.) asked panelists a provocative question about the confirmation process. “How can we make so they don’t deceive or lie about their intentions?” Johnson said of judicial nominees.

“I don’t know that there’s a way to do that,” Derfner replied.

Panelist Dahlia Lithwick, legal analyst and senior editor of Slate Magazine, said the media could do a better job of explaining the issues to the public. ”I think the Supreme Court is exquisitely sensitive to public opinion,” she said.

Last week, Attorney General Eric Holder told black prosecutors in Memphis that the Civil Rights Division is “back and open for business” — a swipe at the Bush administration, which tried to dismantle it. (Read Holder’s speech, delivered near the spot where Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, here.)

Then on Monday, civil rights activists emerged from a meeting with Holder in Washington to say he’s expressed a commitment to pursuing ”cold cases” against 1960s-era civil rights offenders that have languished for years.

Alvin Sykes, the driving force behind the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, told reporters that perpetrators “should understand that this attorney general means business.”

The legislation, which was enacted last year, authorized up to $135 million over 10 years for investigations of civil rights-era killings. It also created a permanent cold case unit in the Justice Department. Congress, however, has not yet approved funding, though some money is included in the House and Senate appropriations bills for the DOJ now pending.

For a bit of background on the unsolved crimes bill, and the case of Emmet Till, who was beaten and shot to death in 1955 after he allegedly whistled at a white woman, click here.

And some quick stats, as reported by The Chicago Tribune: According to the FBI, there are more than 100 unsolved civil rights killings that occurred before 1969 that are under review. Since 2007, there have been 28 arrests and 22 convictions, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a watchdog group that tracks hate crimes.

Sykes, who spoke on the sidewalk outside the Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building on Constitution Avenue, was joined by Haskell Slaughter Young & Rediker’s G. Douglas Jones. As U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, Jones successfully re-opened and prosecuted the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing of 1963.

Jones emphasized the urgency of putting the law into motion. “Each day that passes, we lose potential defendants,” he said. Evidence falls through the cracks, he said. In some instances, apathetic law enforcers let investigations languish or abandoned them outright, forcing investigators of today to “reinvent the wheel,” Jones said.

Jones downplayed concerns about funding, saying it would come in time, and he and Sykes said they were heartened by Holder’s receptiveness. ”If you are a perpetrator…and you’re still out there, we and the federal government are coming after you,” Sykes said.

Activist Alvin Sykes will meet with Attorney General Eric Holder to discuss reopening cold cases from the civil rights era, The Associated Press reported today.

The civil rights advocate is known for his work on the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act that passed Congress last year. The legislation allocated $135 million over 10 years for probes of civil rights era murders and established a permanent DOJ cold case section.

Sykes told The AP he intends to ask Holder to focus more DOJ attention on finding witnesses, evidence and victims before times runs out. A date for the meeting has not been set yet, but will be “soon,” The AP said.

Holder has made civil rights cases a top priority since becoming Attorney General. Last month, he called the Justice Department Civil Rights Division the DOJ’s “crown jewel,” but said there is still work to be done.