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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings, Torture and Big Money |
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March 19th,
2007 - Democrats Turn up Heat on Firing of U.S. Attorney |
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Democrats Turn up Heat on Firing
of U.S. Attorney They allege Carol Lam was ousted in San Diego because she was
investigating Republican politicians in Southern California. By Richard A. Serrano Los Angeles Times March 19, 2007 Washington - Senate
Democrats signaled Sunday that of the eight federal prosecutors abruptly
ousted by the Bush administration, the case in San Diego is emerging as the
most troubling because of new allegations that U.S. Atty. Carol C. Lam was
fired in an attempt to shut down investigations into Republican politicians
in Southern California. Appearing on CBS' "Face
the Nation," Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) revealed evidence that Lam
had notified Washington about search warrants in a Republican corruption case
last year. Soon thereafter, a top Justice Department official in Washington
wrote to the White House about a "real problem we have right now with
Carol Lam." "As the evidence comes
in, as we look at the e-mails, there were clearly U.S. attorneys that were
thorns in the side for one reason or another of the Justice Department,"
said Feinstein, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. "And they decided, by
strategy, in one fell swoop to get rid of them." Another Judiciary Committee
member, Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), agreed that an investigation in San
Diego, along with a parallel GOP corruption probe in Los Angeles, might have
been directly linked to Lam's firing. "The most notorious is
the Southern District of California, San Diego," he said on NBC's
"Meet the Press." "In the middle of the investigation she was
fired." Schumer said he was told by
Justice Department officials that Lam and the other U.S. attorneys were fired
because of "performance-related" problems, a reason that Schumer
said the department had been unable to back up. In fact, he said, Deputy
Atty. Gen. Paul J. McNulty later apologized. "He called me on the phone
and said, 'I am sorry that I didn't tell you the truth,' " Schumer said. According to Schumer,
McNulty added: "I was not told that these things were happening by the
people who were supposed to brief me" on why the eight U.S. attorneys
had been fired. "Well, gee whiz,"
Schumer said. "If you're firing someone in the middle of the most heated
political investigation in America, don't you think you ought to have a
reason and know the reason?" Lam spearheaded the case
against Randy "Duke" Cunningham, the former Republican congressman
from Rancho Santa Fe who pleaded guilty to bribery and income tax evasion. He
was sentenced in March 2006 to eight years and four months in prison. In a broadening of the
Cunningham investigation, Feinstein said, Lam turned her sights on two of the
former lawmaker's associates: Brent R. Wilkes, a Poway-based defense
contractor, and Kyle Dustin "Dusty" Foggo, a top CIA official who
abruptly resigned May 8. The two men, friends from childhood, were roommates
at San Diego State University, served as best man at each other's wedding and
named their sons after each other. Feinstein said that on May
10, Lam "sent a notice to the Justice Department saying that there would
be two search warrants sent in the case of Dusty Foggo and a defense
contractor. The next day, an e-mail went from the Justice Department to the
White House." The May 11 e-mail was from
D. Kyle Sampson, chief of staff to Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales, to White
House Deputy Counsel William Kelley. "The real problem we have right now
with Carol Lam … leads me to conclude that we should have someone ready to be
nominated on 11/18, the day her four-year term expires," it said. Sampson, who resigned last
week, may also have been referring in the May 11 e-mail to a report that
morning in the Los Angeles Times concerning a parallel investigation by
federal prosecutors in Los Angeles into Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands), then
the chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, and Bill Lowery,
a former GOP congressman from San Diego who after leaving Congress founded a
successful lobbying firm - one of whose clients was Wilkes. The Los Angeles
investigation, an outgrowth of the Cunningham case, focused on the close
relationship between the two men, who had served together on the House
Appropriations Committee. Clients of Lowery's lobbying firm had been awarded
millions of dollars in earmarks authorized by Lewis, The Times reported, and
members of Lewis' staff had been hired by Lowery's firm, where they worked as
lobbyists for several years and then returned to Lewis' staff. Lam was notified of her
firing Dec. 7; she stepped down in February. Two days before leaving office,
she announced federal grand jury indictments of Wilkes and Foggo. Wilkes was accused of
bribing Cunningham and Foggo, who as CIA executive director ran the agency's
daily operations, to get contracts for his companies. Wilkes was head of ADCS
Inc., which initially converted documents from paper to digital formats for
the military and expanded into other information technology services, and two
smaller logistics and lobbying firms. In his plea agreement,
Cunningham acknowledged using his position on the defense appropriations
subcommittee to get millions of dollars in federal contracts for ADCS. Foggo, who at one time was
the CIA's deputy ethics officer, was charged with conspiracy and money
laundering for failing to disclose lavish gifts, meals and trips from Wilkes. The indictment alleges that
Foggo used his position at the CIA to pressure subordinates into awarding
contracts to companies run by Wilkes; in return, Wilkes promised to hire
Foggo after he retired from the agency. Details of the contracts, except for
one to provide bottled water to U.S. personnel in the Middle East, are
classified. Wilkes and Foggo entered not
guilty pleas last month. Lam has declined to be
interviewed, saying Friday that she did not wish to discuss the widening
scandal. But in testimony on Capitol Hill on March 6, she said she could not
pin her ouster on the Cunningham case or the other GOP corruption
investigations it spawned. "I've seen those
suggestions," she said. But, she added, "I was
given no reason, and I did not receive any communication directly from the
department about it being related to the investigation." The Justice Department and
the White House have declined to discuss exactly why Lam was let go. But a second e-mail from
Sampson, dated May 3 and titled "Immigration Enforcement," took Lam
to task for not prosecuting more border crime cases and suggesting that she
should be "woodshedded" over the matter. That e-mail raises more
questions, because Lam had received glowing evaluations for her work fighting
border crime. Carl Tobias, a law professor
at the University of Richmond who has monitored the U.S. attorneys scandal,
said there was growing evidence that Lam's termination might be the one most
directly linked to retaliation for GOP corruption investigations. "Lam's situation seems
to be the most obvious example, given the timing of the Sampson e-mails and
the Lewis probe," he said. Democrats also stepped up
their demands Sunday that White House political strategist Karl Rove appear
before the Judiciary Committee and answer questions about whether the firings
were part of an initial plan to terminate all 93 U.S. attorneys during
President Bush's second term. Sen. Patrick J. Leahy
(D-Vt.), who chairs the Judiciary Committee, said unless there was more
cooperation from the White House, Rove and other administration officials
would be subpoenaed. External link: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-usattys19mar19,1,4234941.story |