Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday said the new Western District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney is a trailblazer in the state, the Daily World of Opelousas, La., reported.

Stephanie Finley (DOJ)

Holder praised Stephanie Finley during her ceremonial investiture for being the first female U.S. Attorney in Louisiana. Finley has led the office since June.

“Another barrier has been broken,” said Holder, according to the newspaper. “Another ceiling has been shattered.”

Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), who also attended the investiture, said Finley is “a real pathfinder and a leader in so many ways,” The Advocate of Baton Rouge, La., reported.

The Attorney General said the U.S. Attorney has strong record as a leader and as a prosecutor in the Western District of Louisiana. Finley started at the office as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in 1995.

The U.S. Attorney said she planned to “breathe life” into the courts, according to the Daily World.

“This is a wonderful opportunity to pay it forward to all of you,” Finley said, according to the newspaper.

The Attorney General has attended 14 U.S. Attorney investitures thus far. He and Landrieu also went to the swearing-in ceremony for U.S. District Judge Brian A. Jackson of the Middle District of Louisiana on Monday, according to a Justice Department spokeswoman.

The Senate confirmed by voice vote Friday two more U.S. Attorneys.

They are:

• Stephanie Finley was tapped on Jan. 20 to replace acting U.S. Attorney William Flanagan in the Western District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney’s office. Flanagan has led the Shreveport, La.-based office since Donald Washington stepped down as U.S. Attorney in January. Flanagan’s son, Robert, made national headlines in January for allegedly tampering with the phones in the office of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) with three men including conservative documentary film-maker James O’Keefe. Finley has been an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana since 1995. Read more about her here.


Laura Duffy (voiceofsandiego.org)

• Laura Duffy was nominated on Feb. 24 to be U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of California. She is the first Senate-confirmed U.S. Attorney in the Southern District since Carol Lam, who was one of the U.S. Attorneys dismissed during 2006 by the Bush administration. Read more about Duffy here.

The Senate has now confirmed 51 of President Barack Obama’s U.S. Attorney nominees. The chamber has yet to consider another 16 would-be U.S. Attorneys who are waiting for votes in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The Senate Judiciary Committee approved by voice vote two more of President Barack Obama’s U.S. Attorney nominees at its meeting Thursday.

They are:

• Stephanie Finley was tapped on Jan. 20 to replace acting U.S. Attorney William Flanagan in the Western District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney’s office. Flanagan has led the Shreveport, La.-based office since Donald Washington stepped down as U.S. Attorney in January. Flanagan’s son, Robert, made national headlines in January for allegedly tampering with the phones in the office of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) with three men including conservative documentary film-maker James O’Keefe. The nominee has been an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana since 1995. Read more about her here.


Laura Duffy (voiceofsandiego.org)

• Laura Duffy was nominated on Feb. 24 to be U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of California. She would be the first Senate-confirmed U.S. Attorney in the Southern District since Carol Lam, who was one of the U.S. Attorneys dismissed during 2006 by the Bush administration. The district’s current interim U.S. Attorney is Karen P. Hewitt. Read more about her here.

The panel has now approved 51 of Obama’s U.S. Attorney nominees, 49 of whom have won Senate confirmation. The committee has yet to schedule votes for another 16 would-be U.S. Attorneys.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is slated to vote on President Barack Obama’s nominee to lead the Western District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney’s office at its meeting Thursday.

Stephanie Finley was tapped on Jan. 20 to replace acting U.S. Attorney William Flanagan, who has led the Shreveport, La.-based office since Donald Washington stepped down as U.S. Attorney in January. Flanagan’s son, Robert, made national headlines in January for allegedly tampering with the phones in the office of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) with three men including conservative documentary film-maker James O’Keefe.

The nominee has been an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana since 1995. Read more about her here.

The committee has yet to schedule votes for another 16 would-be U.S. Attorneys. The panel has approved 49 of Obama’s U.S. Attorney nominees, 48 of whom have won Senate confirmation.

Stephanie A. Finley (Grambling State University, Southern University Law Center) is nominated to be U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana. She would replace Donald W. Washington, who was the district’s U.S. Attorney from 2001 to Jan. 18, 2010, when he returned to private practice. The district’s current acting U.S. Attorney is William J. Flanagan.

Her vitals:

• Born in Pineville, La., in 1966.
• Received a certificate of completion from Professional Military Education’s Squadron Officers School in 1998.
• Received a certificate of completion from Air Command and Staff College in 2007.
• Currently enrolled in Air War College.
• Has been an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Western District of Louisiana since October 1995. Has served as senior litigation counsel since 2007 and served as Acting Deputy Criminal Chief from November 2008 to July 2009.
• Has been an Assistant Staff Judge Advocate in the U.S. Air Force Reserves since October 1995.
• Was an Assistant Staff Judge Advocate on active duty with the U.S. Air Force from October 1991 to September 1995.
• Was an adjunct professor at St. Leo Community College from 1993 to 1995.
• Clerked for Brooke, Morial, Cassibry, Fraiche and Pizza during the summer of 1990, the Louisiana Department of Labor from 1989-1991 and the Rapides Parish Sheriff Department during the summer of 1988.
• Was a cashier at Super One Food Stores in Baton Rouge, La., from May 1989 to July 1989.
• Holds the rank of Lt. Colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserves and Captain in the U.S. Air Force.
• Has tried approximately 50 cases to verdict, acting as sole counsel in all but two. Also has tried matters before administrative discharge boards of the U.S. Air Force.

Click here for her full Senate Judiciary Committee questionnaire.

UPDATE: On her Senate Judiciary financial disclosure she reports assets of $987,600 mostly from real estate. She reports owning her personal residence and seven rental properties valued at a total $595,000. Finley also reports liabilities of $350,100 for a net worth of $637,500.

On her Office of Government Ethics financial disclosure Finley reports that she has one rental property in Alexandria, La., one in Pineville, La., and five rental properties in Marksville, La.

Just as some Justice Department offices in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast finally are back in business after an earlier one-two punch of winter storms had laid them low earlier in the week, another storm that is bringing several inches of snow to the South closed U.S. Attorney’s offices in five districts today.

According to DOJ spokeswoman Melissa Schwartz, the shuttered offices are the:

• Southern District of Mississippi.
• Southern District of Alabama (Mobile office).
• Middle District of Alabama.
• Western District of Louisiana (Shreveport office).
• Eastern District of Texas (Plano, Sherman and Texarkana offices).

The branch offices for Northern District of Texas in Dallas and Fort Worth opened late today. The Eastern District of Texas’s branch offices in Tyler and Lufkin also had late openings today.

Many employees at shuttered offices are still able to work remotely, using communications technology such as BlackBerries, cell phones and laptop computers, DOJ officials have said.

Most of this week, many U.S. Attorney’s offices across the East Coast were closed because of two crippling blizzards that dumped more than a foot of snow. DOJ headquarters in Washington also had limited operations.

Today, all of the U.S. Attorney’s offices that were closed this week have been reopened and the DOJ operations in Washington are back to normal, according to DOJ officials.

The lawyer for one of the men arrested for tampering with a senator’s phones is meeting with prosecutors in an effort to reach a resolution in the 24-year-old man’s case, The Associated Press reported today.

J. Garrison Jordan, the attorney for Robert Flanagan — the son of Western District of Louisiana acting U.S. Attorney William Flanagan – wouldn’t elaborate on the talks he had Wednesday with prosecutors about the charges against his client.

“We’re in discussions with the government, trying to resolve this matter as expeditiously as possible in a fair and just manner,” Jordan told AP.

Robert Flanagan allegedly joined James O’Keefe and two other men in a purported scheme to interfere with phones at Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu’s New Orleans office, according to the AP. O’Keefe was already noteworthy, having gained notoriety for secret videos he shot last year involving the community organizing group ACORN.

A spokeswoman for the Eastern District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney’s Office, which is handling the case, declined to comment.

The four men were charged last month with using false pretenses to enter a federal building with the intent to commit a felony after they allegedly pretended to be telephone company repairmen who were at the Landrieu’s office to fix problems with the phone system.

The four defendants are free on $10,000 bonds. Their lawyers decided to waive a preliminary hearing that was set for this week, according to the AP. A judge hasn’t set a date for their next court appearance, the AP said.

Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) will no longer hold up federal nominations in his state after receiving assurance that the job of the George W. Bush-holdover U.S. Attorney in New Orleans is safe, The Times-Picayune reported today.

David Vitter (Gov)

The Republican senator now will return his “blue slip” on Western District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney nominee Stephanie Finley and other federal nominees, which he had been withholding until he received official word on the status of U.S. Attorney Jim Letten.

The Senate Judiciary Committee traditionally does not consider a nomination until it receives a “blue slip” from the nominee’s home state senator.

Vitter had asked the administration to keep Letten, who has led the Eastern District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney’s Office since 2001. Today, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that Letten would serve on the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee, which serves as the voice of U.S. Attorneys throughout the nation, sending a strong signal that his job was safe.

“This prestigious appointment makes it crystal clear that Jim isn’t going anywhere except on regular trips to Washington to personally advise the attorney general,” Vitter told the newspaper. “The attorney general and I superficially discussed this in our meeting last Thursday and I’m really excited to get it done.”

Letten’s office is handling the case against four men who allegedly tried to interfere with phones at Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu’s New Orleans office. One of the men, Robert Flanagan, is the son of Western District of Louisiana acting U.S. Attorney William Flanagan. James O’Keefe, who gained notoriety for secret videos of the community organizing group ACORN, was one of Flanagan’s accomplices.

Andrew Breitbart, the founder of BigGovernment.com, which employs O’Keefe, said today on Fox News that Letten leaked information on the incident in a “concerted effort” to put O’Keefe in a bad light. Letten’s office denied the allegation.

President Barack Obama tapped five lawyers to lead U.S. Attorney’s offices in Louisiana, West Virginia, Kentucky and New York, the White House announced today.

They are:

-Stephanie Finley (Western District of Louisiana): She has been an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana since 1995. Finley would succeed Donald Washington, who stepped down as U.S. Attorney this week to enter private practice.

-R. Booth Goodwin (Southern District of West Virginia): He has been an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of West Virginia since 2001. Goodwin would replace U.S. Attorney Charles T. Miller.

David Hale (Reed Weitkamp Schell & Vice)

-David Hale (Western District of Kentucky): He has been an attorney at Reed Weitkamp Schell & Vice since 1999 Hale previously served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky. Hale would succeed David Huber, who resigned as U.S. Attorney in January 2o09. Read more about the nominee here.

-Kerry Harvey (Eastern District of Kentucky): He has been the general counsel and acting inspector general of the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services since 2008. He previously was a partner at Owen, Harvey, and Carter.

Loretta Lynch (Hogan & Hartson)

-Loretta Lynch (Eastern District of New York): She is a former U.S. Attorney for Eastern District of New York. She served from 1999 to 2001, after nine years as an Assistant U.S. Attorney. She is currently a partner at Hogan & Hartson. Read more about her here.

The former U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana will join a national law firm at its Lafayette, La., office.

Donald Washington, who served as U.S. Attorney from 2001 until yesterday, will focus on white collar litigation and federal and state criminal investigations at Jones Walker, according to a news release from the law firm.

Donald Washington (DOJ)

“Don’s extensive background as in-house corporate counsel, conducting corporate investigations, and in litigation will build upon our strong litigation practice, and he is a particularly good complement to our existing practice in the area of health care and energy litigation, white collar crime, and government investigations,” William H. Hines, Jones Walker’s managing partner, said in the news release. “The depth of his knowledge and experience navigating complex legal issues and federal investigations will be a huge asset.”

Washington said in the news release that he joined the law firm because it “presents exciting, geographically diverse representation opportunities.”

“It provides an excellent platform for someone with my background to continue serving clients seeking a just resolution to their legal issues, while practicing with some of the most prominent and widely recognized lawyers in the nation,” he said.

Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) last summer recommended that President Barack Obama nominate either John Belton or Stephanie Finley for the Western District U.S. Attorney post.