CREW ASKS AG GONZALES FOR SPECIAL PROSECUTOR TO PROBE U.S. ATTORNEY FIRINGS

13 Mar 2007 // Washington, DC – Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) today sent a letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales asking for the immediate appointment of a Special Prosecutor to investigate potential criminal violations related to the recent dismissals of eight U.S. Attorneys. CREW also asked the Department of Justice’s Inspector General and Office of Professional Responsibility to investigate the situation.

In the past few months, Department of Justice (DOJ) officials have testified before Congress that the U.S. Attorneys were asked to resign for performance related reasons, that the White House was minimally involved in the firings and that the Department was in no way attempting to evade the confirmation process for new U.S. Attorneys.

Documents provided by the DOJ to Congress suggest that at least one high-ranking official, D. Kyle Sampson, knew that the statements made to Congress were untrue. If, as it appears, a Department of Justice official allowed other officials to provide inaccurate information to Congress, federal crimes may have been committed. Because DOJ obviously cannot investigate and prosecute the misconduct of its own officials, CREW has called on the attorney general to appoint a Special Prosecutor to handle this matter.

It is clear that at least two officials, former White House Legal Counsel Harriet Miers and Sampson, schemed to fire prosecutors for political reasons. According to press reports, Sampson has acknowledged that he did not tell DOJ officials about the extent of his communications with the White House regarding the firings. Justice officials who testified before Congress, including the attorney general, Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty and Principal Associate Attorney General William Moschella, all told Congress that the White House, though consulted, was not deeply involved in the firing decisions.

Federal law provides that if Sampson knew that he was causing DOJ officials to make inaccurate statements to Congress, he can be prosecuted for the federal crime of lying to Congress even though he did not personally make any statements to Congress. The Special Prosecutor should investigate not only Mr. Sampson’s conduct but whether anyone else was involved in formulating the incomplete and erroneous congressional testimony or whether the officials who testified were aware that they were providing imperfect information to Congress.

CREW Executive Director Melanie Sloan said, “Given the murky nature of this situation and the unresolved questions of what top level Justice officials knew, when they knew it and whether they deliberately withheld information from Congress, Attorney General Gonzales should immediately appoint a Special Prosecutor.” Sloan continued, “Both Congress and the American people deserve a full accounting of the truth behind the firings of the U.S. Attorneys. If the attorney general doesn’t want to see the truth come out, perhaps the Inspector General will.”

CREW’s letter to Attorney General Gonzales and related documents are available on CREW’s website.

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Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) is a non-profit legal watchdog group dedicated to holding public officials accountable for their actions.

For more information, please visit www.citizensforethics.org or contact Naomi Seligman Steiner at 202.408.5565/press@citizensforethics.org.