Chief Investigator Says Justice Department Is Blocking Probe Into Fired Prosecutors
January 29th, 2008
WASHINGTON — The head of a federal inquiry into the firings of eight U.S. attorneys claims the Justice Department has impeded his investigation.
In a letter sent to Attorney General Michael Mukasey last week, Office of Special Counsel chief Scott J. Bloch said the department has thrown up roadblocks that hindered his investigation.
Specifically, Bloch said, the department’s inspector general and office of legal counsel asked him to step aside until internal investigations are finished.
But that could take months, Bloch wrote, effectively pushing his agency’s role “into the very last months of the administration when there is little hope of any corrective measures or discipline possible.”
The Office of Special Counsel is a small, independent federal agency charged with protecting the rights of federal workers and ensuring that government whistle-blowers aren’t subject to reprisal.
Bloch also complained that his attempts to meet with White House Counsel Fred Fielding to discuss the investigation have been rebuffed. The White House did not immediately return phone and e-mail messages seeking comment Tuesday.
The firings of eight U.S. attorneys provoked a backlash on Capitol Hill last year, where lawmakers questioned whether the moves were politically motivated. That undermined the position of Alberto Gonzales, who wound up resigning as attorney general. (A ninth U.S. attorney, Todd Graves in Missouri, said he was forced out).
Bloch’s letter was first reported Tuesday by the Los Angeles Times and MinnPost.com, an online Minnesota news site.
Bloch also complains about the investigation into the performance of Rachel Paulose, who recently stepped down as U.S. attorney for Minnesota amid complaints about her management style, to take a job with the department’s Office of Legal Policy.
He referenced a letter he had sent to Mukasey on Nov. 19 — the same day that Paulose announced her resignation — in which Bloch concluded that there is a “substantial likelihood that U.S. Attorney Paulose has grossly mismanaged” the U.S. attorney’s office “and has engaged in abuses of her authority” in that job.
Bloch’s agency had referred allegations about Paulose to the inspector general’s office, but the office told him by telephone in October that it had “asked around” and wasn’t planning to do anything.
Then in December, according to Bloch, Associate Deputy Attorney General David Margolis wrote to him, demanding a retraction from Bloch’s “substantial likelihood” finding. That finding was based on allegations made by John Marti, who resigned from his management post as first assistant U.S. Attorney under Paulose.
Bloch bluntly asks Mukasey: “Are you requesting that I report to the president that you refuse to investigate disclosures of wrongdoing made by a career federal prosecutor, an employee of your agency?”
The department’s behavior, Bloch claims, “reveals a disturbing pattern of disregard for the authority of my office.”
In an e-mail, Justice Department spokesman Peter Carr said, “We are reviewing the letter and will respond to Mr. Bloch as appropriate.”
Mukasey is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, his first oversight hearing since becoming attorney general.
Bloch himself is under federal investigation for alleged misconduct.
In 2005, a group of current and former Special Counsel employees filed a complaint against him, claiming he retaliated against those who disagreed with his policies through intimidation and involuntary transfers. The Office of Personnel Management is investigating.
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January 31st, 2008 at 2:54 am
Joe Carson, on January 30th, 2008 at 4:14 pm Said:
To: Whom It May Concern
From: Joe Carson, PE, , netmultiple-time prevailing whistleblower in Dept. of Energy , petitioner in multiple cases against US Office of Special Counsel (OSC) Knoxville, TN 865-300-5831
Subject: Special Counsel Scott Bloch letter to AG Mukasey (attached) and LA Times Story of January 29, 2008
I am a co-founder of OSC Watch , which has 3 objectives: 1) expose how the OSC, since 1989, has failed to comply with its primary statutory duty - to protect federal employees from prohibited personal practices (PPP’s), 2) stop OSC’s lawbreaking, and 3) obtain a measure of justice and restoration for the 10,000 or more loyal, patriotic, federal employees, who sought OSC’s protection from PPP’s since 1989 and failed to obtain the protection OSC is required to provide. The members of the OSC Watch Steering Committee are nearing completion of a petition to Congress to conduct oversight of OSC focused on OSC Watch’s concerns about systemic and persistent OSC lawbreaking.
I am also a party to a number of legal actions against OSC, alleging a number of aspects and instances of OSC’s failure to comply with relevant law to protect federal employees from PPP’s or report the results of investigations it conducts per 1216. In those cases, it is an assistant United States Attorney who represents OSC against my claims of OSC’s failures to protect federal employees, including United States attorneys, against PPP’s. Had OSC complied with its statutory duties to protect federal employees from PPP since 1989, I think that the Department of Justice, as other federal agencies, particularly the Department of Energy, would be much different places and I think national tragedies, such as 9/11, failure of levees in New Orleans, loss of space shuttle Columbia, might have been averted and the Department of Justice would be much more resistant to being used as a political spoil. A trial court decision in one of those cases, finding significant OSC non-compliance with aspects of it statutory duties to protect me, is attached.
My comments are Special Counsel Bloch’s letter to AG Mukasey are focused on its first two pages about OSC’s PPP investigations (conducted per 1214) and the Hatch Act and 1216(a)(4) investigations at DOJ.
1. Special Counsel Bloch’s legal claims about his jurisdiction to investigate violations of law under OSC’s jurisdiction by DOJ are correct, as far as he goes. But he fails to state what his fundamental statutory duty is to the DOJ employee(s) who filed PPP complaints with OSC - to investigate the PPP complaint, to determine the whether “there are reasonable grounds to believe a PPP has occurred, exists, or is to be taken,” and appropriately report that PPP determination. If OSC makes a positive PPP determination, it must report it to AG Mukasey per 1214(e), to enable AG Mukasey to comply with his statutory obligation to “prevent PPP’s” in DOJ, per 5 USC 2302(c). That is where OSC’s statutory duties end, it has complete discretion as a prosecutorial agency about formally seeking corrective action or disciplinary action as a result of his PPP investigations. Mr. Bloch’s five year tenure at Special Counsel will end, coincidentally, in January 2009, his claims about the end of the current administration are disingenuous, it is his statutory 5 year tenure ending that is more relevant.
2) Special Counsel Bloch fails to mention that he has subpoena power over DOJ to execute his legal jurisdiction over it, as described at 5 USC 1212(b). He apparently has not subpoenaed DOJ for information to this point. If he issues subpoenas DOJ for documents, depositions, or responses to interrogatories and DOJ does not comply with OSC’s subpoena, OSC can request the US Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) to seek an order from Federal District Court to enforce it. MSPB would use its attorneys, not DOJ ones, in such an action.
I suggest the following questions for OSC:
1) How many PPP complaints, alleging how many specific PPP’s, has it received from DOJ employees since 2001?
2) How many times has OSC determined “there are reasonable grounds to believe a PPP has occurred, exists, or is to be taken,” as a result of its investigations of these PPP complaints?
3) For each positive PPP determination, where is the public record of its determination, its transmittal of that determination to DOJ, and the Attorney General Certified DOJ response, as required by 5 USC 1214(e) and 1219(a)(3)?
4) Why has OSC not subpoenaed DOJ to provide the information OSC needs to conduct its ongoing PPP investigations?