Ethics complaint hits AG nominee

26 Jan 2005 // A complaint against Attorney General-designate Alberto Gonzales was filed Tuesday with the State Bar of Texas over his account to the Senate Judiciary Committee of his role in getting George W. Bush excused from jury duty a decade ago.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a liberal-leaning nonprofit group, also asked the committee to put off a vote on the Gonzales nomination today until the "matter is cleared up."

The group says Gonzales misstated facts to the Senate committee about a 1996 incident in which he, as the governor's counsel, got Bush excused from jury duty on a drunken driving case to avoid making public acknowledgment of his own DWI conviction.

Gonzales' version of his role differs sharply from another recollection of events reported by Newsweek.

Melanie Sloan, head of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said the contrast between the two versions of events "is enough to require the State Bar of Texas to investigate the matter."

"Violations of the bar can lead to disbarment," she said.

Kim Davey, a State Bar of Texas spokeswoman, said she could "neither confirm nor deny receiving a complaint" from the watchdog group.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to meet today on the nomination.

Bush's DWI conviction in Maine in the mid 1970s became an issue late in the 2000 presidential race when a television reporter broke the story on the decades-old conviction.

Bush avoided jury duty in 1996 with help from Gonzales who kept him from answering a prospective juror form that would have forced acknowledgement of the conviction.

Gonzales argued that since the governor might be asked to grant clemency, the potential conflict should excuse Bush from jury duty.

The Newsweek story quotes a defense lawyer, a judge and a prosecutor who claim Gonzales sought an off-the-record conference in the judge's chambers. Judge David Crain then agreed to a motion to strike Bush from the jury, as sought by the defense lawyer.