ALLEGATIONS OF SELECTIVE PROSECUTION: THE

EROSION OF PUBLIC CONFIDENCE IN OUR

FEDERAL JUSTICE SYSTEM

JOINT HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, 

AND HOMELAND SECURITY

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COMMERCIAL AND 

ADMINISTRATIVE LAW

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

OCTOBER 23, 2007

Serial No. 110–61

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://judiciary.house.gov 

ALLEGATIONS OF SELECTIVE PROSECUTION:

THE EROSION OF PUBLIC CONFIDENCE IN OUR FEDERAL JUSTICE SYSTEM

U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402–0001

38–507 PDF 2008

ALLEGATIONS OF SELECTIVE PROSECUTION: THE

EROSION OF PUBLIC CONFIDENCE IN OUR

FEDERAL JUSTICE SYSTEM

JOINT HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, 

AND HOMELAND SECURITY

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COMMERCIAL AND 

ADMINISTRATIVE LAW

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

OCTOBER 23, 2007

Serial No. 110–61

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://judiciary.house.gov 

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

JOHN CONYERS, JR., Michigan, Chairman 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

RICK BOUCHER, Virginia 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

ROBERT C. ‘‘BOBBY’’ SCOTT, Virginia 

MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

ROBERT WEXLER, Florida 

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California 

STEVE COHEN, Tennessee 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

BETTY SUTTON, Ohio 

LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, Illinois 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York 

ADAM B. SCHIFF, California 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida 

KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

CHRIS CANNON, Utah 

RIC KELLER, Florida 

DARRELL ISSA, California 

MIKE PENCE, Indiana 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

TOM FEENEY, Florida 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas 

JIM JORDAN, Ohio

PERRY APELBAUM, Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

JOSEPH GIBSON, Minority Chief Counsel 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY

ROBERT C. ‘‘BOBBY’’ SCOTT, Virginia, Chairman

MAXINE WATERS, California 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

BETTY SUTTON, Ohio 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California

BOBBY VASSAR, Chief Counsel 

MICHAEL VOLKOV, Minority Counsel 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COMMERCIAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California, Chairwoman 

JOHN CONYERS, JR., Michigan 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina 

STEVE COHEN, Tennessee 

CHRIS CANNON, Utah 

JIM JORDAN, Ohio 

RIC KELLER, Florida 

TOM FEENEY, Florida 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona

MICHONE JOHNSON, Chief Counsel 

DANIEL FLORES, Minority Counsel 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

OCTOBER 23, 2007

Page 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

The Honorable Robert C. ‘‘Bobby’’ Scott, a Representative in Congress from 

the State of Virginia, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, 

and Homeland Security ....................................................................................... 1

The Honorable J. Randy Forbes, a Representative in Congress from the 

State of Virginia, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security .......................................................................... 3

The Honorable Linda T. Sa ́nchez, a Representative in Congress from the 

State of California, and Chairwoman, Subcommittee on Commercial and 

Administrative Law ............................................................................................. 194

The Honorable Chris Cannon, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Utah, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law ........................................................................................................... 200

The Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the 

State of Michigan, Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary, and Member, 

Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law .................................. 207

WITNESSES 

The Honorable Richard Thornburgh, Kirkpatrick and Lockhart Preston Gates 

Ellis, LLP, Washington, DC 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 209

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 213

Mr. Donald C. Shields, Professor, University of Missouri-St. Louis, Kansas 

City, MO 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 224

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 226

G. Douglas Jones, Esquire, Whatley, Drake and Kallas, Birmingham, AL 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 271

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 274

APPENDIX 

Material Submitted for the Hearing Record .......................................................... 388

(1)

ALLEGATIONS OF SELECTIVE PROSECUTION: 

THE EROSION OF PUBLIC CONFIDENCE IN 

OUR FEDERAL JUSTICE SYSTEM 

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2007

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM,

AND HOMELAND SECURITY

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COMMERCIAL

AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW, 

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, 

Washington, DC.

The Subcommittees met, pursuant to notice, at 10:10 a.m., in 

Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable Robert 

C. ‘‘Bobby’’ Scott (Chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security) presiding. 

Present from the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security: Representatives Scott, Waters, Delahunt, Johnson, 

Jackson Lee, Davis, Baldwin, Sutton, Forbes, Gohmert, Coble, 

Chabot, and Lungren. 

Present from the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law: Representatives Conyers, Sa ́nchez, Johnson, Lofgren, 

Delahunt, Watt, Cohen, Cannon, Jordan, and Keller. 

Staff present: Bobby Vassar, Chief Counsel, Subcommittee on 

Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security; Michone Johnson, Chief 

Counsel, Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law; 

Eric Tamarkin, Majority Counsel; Mario Dispenza, Majority Counsel; and Veronica Eligan, Professional Staff Member. 

Mr. SCOTT. The hearing will come to order. 

Good morning. I am pleased to open this hearing on Allegations 

of Selective Prosecution: The Erosion of Public Confidence in our 

Federal Judicial System. 

For some months now, we have been looking at the issue of 

whether some United States attorneys were fired because of their 

unwillingness to bring politically based prosecutions. Of course, if 

there is evidence that some U.S. attorneys were fired for their failure to bring politically based prosecutions, that leaves the question 

of whether any of those not fired kept their jobs because they were 

willing to bring such prosecutions. 

Today’s hearing focuses on this aspect of the question as the continuing investigation of the issue of whether there is inappropriate 

politicization within the Department of Justice and looking at instances in which prosecutions appear to have been politically motivated. 

2

United States Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson once said, 

‘‘While the prosecutor at his best is one of the most beneficent 

forces in our society, when he acts from malice or other base motives, he is one of the worst. Therefore, he should have as nearly 

as possible a detached and impartial view of all groups in his community.’’

Unfortunately, however, evidence has come to light that the 

United States Department of Justice may be falling far short of 

holding a detached and impartial view. Allegations have risen that 

U.S. attorneys have aggressively investigated political opponents 

for activity that was only technically criminal or not even criminal 

at all, then timed the announcement of indictments to affect elections. 

U.S. attorneys have also been accused of selectively prosecuting 

only Democrats for activities in which Republicans have engaged in 

similar activities. In fact, the latest statistics in one study that we 

will hear today showed that of 375 investigations of political candidates and officeholders initiated under the Bush administration’s 

Department of Justice, 80 percent have been against Democrats, 

and this disparity in the department’s focus calls its objectivity into 

question. 

We have researched the trend and uncovered a number of disturbing incidents that raise questions as to the department’s impartiality, and since we announced plans to conduct this hearing, 

a steady flow of cases has come to our attention that deserve attention, but time prohibits us from detailing them fully. 

We will hear about a number of specific cases today, but I want 

to focus briefly on just one case that highlights both the doubtfulness and the selectiveness of prosecutorial activity. 

Paul Minor was a major Democratic contributor in Mississippi 

and a trial lawyer who had won two major lawsuits against companies that may have been involved with the U.S. attorney. He was 

indicted for guaranteeing loans and providing houses for Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz. The justice had recently won an election to the Mississippi high court over a close 

friend of the U.S. attorney’s and was indicted on corruption charges 

for his dealings with Paul Minor. 

Like a number of other cases we will hear today, the indictments 

were announced 90 days before a major election, in this case the 

2003 gubernatorial election, and that announcement was widely 

seen as an attempt to paint the Democratic Party as corrupt. The 

dubiousness of the allegations comes from the fact that although 

there were, in fact, financial dealings between Paul Minor and the 

justice, there was no evidence of influencing the justice or even an 

attempt to influence him. 

The prosecution offered no evidence that the justice presided over 

any cases that Paul Minor brought before the court. Moreover, investigators never even interviewed the justice’s fellow jurists to determine whether he had improperly influenced any cases involving 

Paul Minor or anyone associated with him. 

And, finally, the activity for which Paul Minor was indicted had 

been commonplace in Mississippi, and prosecutions for such impropriety had never been brought in the past. Ultimately, Paul Minor 

and the justice were acquitted of any charges of activity between 

3

them. However, the acquittal was long after the Mississippi gubernatorial race, which was won by the Republican candidate. 

The allegation of selectivity in the case stems from the fact that 

the U.S. attorney apparently ignored activity of a major Republican 

contributor and brother-in-law to a Republican U.S. senator. The 

Republican contributor also made loans to the justice and was Paul 

Minor’s co-owner of the very building that the justice used as his 

residence for which Paul Minor was indicted. Yet the Republican 

contributor was not even investigated, let alone indicted. 

In fact, when the investigating FBI agent brought the evidence 

about this very Republican contributor to the attention of the U.S. 

attorney, the agent was transferred to an antiterrorism unit in 

Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and was replaced by an agent who had 

contributed to the Republican Governor Haley Barbour’s campaign. 

Mr. Minor had entered a lengthy and articulate motion to dismiss the charges against him, which the trial court did not grant. 

However, without objection, I would like to enter Mr. Minor’s Motion to Dismiss on the record so the details of the allegation here 

can be fully recognized. 

This is just one of a growing list of cases in which U.S. attorneys 

have allegedly attacked political rivals, while allowing similar activity by its allies to go unchallenged. It is incumbent upon us as 

part of our congressional oversight responsibilities to determine to 

what extent these determined allegations are true, and that is why 

we are holding this hearing. 

I would like to now recognize my friend and Virginia colleague, 

the distinguished Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, the Honorable Randy Forbes who represents Virginia’s Fourth Congressional District. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Chairman, today is another sad and embarrassing day for 

the Judiciary Committee. Rather than focusing on important issues 

to the American people, such as the rise in violent crime, the threat 

of terrorism, violence on college campuses, the increase in international gangs, the invasion of Chinese espionage agents into our 

country, the majority is wasting our time to try and create smoke 

where there is no fire and deal once again with politics, politics and 

politics. 

It is sad to see how the historical traditions surrounding the Judiciary Committee have been jettisoned in favor of partisanship, all 

to the detriment of the American people. Is it any wonder why 

Congress’s approval ratings are so low right now? 

So we bring in our usual cadre of witnesses, and we have hearings on things that we never did before: ongoing trials. We bring 

people in here, and then we limit the cross-examination to these 

fine men to 5 minutes apiece. Wouldn’t that be wonderful if you 

could be in a trial setting, some of the very trials that the Chairman mentioned earlier, but you could say to the attorneys who 

were doing the cross-examination, ‘‘But you are only going to have 

5 minutes to ask these people any questions,’’ and, also, it would 

be good because prosecutors have barred most of these cases from 

coming in here and putting on their side of the story. 

This hearing is not a review of the abuse of prosecutorial discretion. We have raised that for months now. If it were, we would be 

4

examining the Duke Lacrosse players where the defendants were 

fully exonerated and the prosecutor disbarred. 

Some of these cases, we have situations where you had individuals brought before a court, the judge tried the case, the jury found 

them guilty, they were sentenced, they have an appeals process to 

go through, and yet we want to look at that. But in other cases, 

we have situations, as in the Nifong case and the Duke players, 

where they have been completely exonerated. 

Have we listened to that? Have we looked at that? No. Have we 

heard anything about the political prosecutorial discretion that was 

used in the Texas case against Tom DeLay? No. Have we looked 

at the situation in Louisiana where this Subcommittee went down, 

refused to take testimony on it, but they actually came to another 

hearing we had, and the concern there was that individuals, the 

police and members of the chamber of commerce were saying that 

the prosecutors were not prosecuting corruption, that, in fact, only 

12 percent of the people arrested or less than 12 percent ever went 

to jail. 

But we do not want to listen to those cases. Instead, we are sitting here while the majority embraces baseless claims made by 

criminal defendants who have no other forum in which to allege 

prosecutorial misconduct. This is not a surprise. These ridiculous 

claims have turned the Judiciary Committee into judge and jury of 

criminal prosecutions. I cannot think of a more inappropriate abuse 

of this great institution. 

In its zeal to make mountains out of molehills, the majority is 

questioning the conviction of former Alabama Governor Don 

Siegelman, who was found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of 

bribery, mail fraud and conspiracy by a jury and sentenced to 7 

years in prison. Governor Siegelman was found to be a corrupt politician who sold his public office for money. He was prosecuted by 

a career prosecutor. He was found guilty by a jury of his peers and 

sentenced by a Federal judge with a record of fairness. 

I ask unanimous consent, Mr. Chairman, that statements by U.S. 

Attorney Leura Garrett Canary and Acting U.S. Attorney Louis V. 

Franklin be submitted for the record. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection. 

[The statements of Ms. Canary and Mr. Franklin follow:]

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Mr. FORBES. Like any defendant who has been found guilty and 

sentenced to jail, Siegelman is now alleging that he was prosecuted 

for political reasons. His credibility is no different than any other 

criminal with a motive to say anything to get out of prison. 

What is unusual today is that the majority is conducting an investigation based on these claims. The majority’s misguided reliance on these claims is proven by their decision not to call Jill 

Simpson as a witness in this hearing. She is the sole witness who 

made the initial allegation about a single telephone call 5 years 

after the fact, 11 months after Siegelman’s conviction and 1 month 

before his sentencing. Two individuals who she alleged were on the 

telephone have submitted affidavits contradicting her claim. 

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that these statements 

be included in the record. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The statements of Mr. Riley and Mr. Lembke follow:]

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Mr. FORBES. I also ask unanimous consent that the statement of 

Governor Riley’s election attorney be submitted for the record. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Butts follows:]


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Mr. FORBES. The Judiciary Committee staff questioned Simpson 

for hours about her allegation. Her credibility was shredded beyond 

repair. Her statements during the interview were misleading and 

unbelievable. In my view, the Committee should consider referring 

her to the Justice Department for further examination. That is why 

the majority did not want her here today. 

Simpson swore out in affidavit in May 2007 about an alleged 

telephone conversation in November 2002, a conversation that she 

did not memorialize, nor tell anyone about until years later. In her 

affidavit, she alleged that Siegelman conceded the election because 

of a controversy surrounding a KKK rally. When interviewed, 

Simpson changed her story. She claimed for the first time that 

Siegelman had also conceded the election after receiving assurances that he would not be prosecuted. Continuing her fabrication, 

Simpson alleged for the first time in her interview two additional 

conversations regarding Siegelman’s concession and prosecution. 

Finally, in her effort to tie Karl Rove to the Siegelman prosecution, Simpson identified the name Karl in an e-mail discussing a 

FEMA contract as Karl Rove. We have since learned that the Karl 

referred to on the e-mail is Atlanta attorney Karl Dix, contrary to 

Simpson’s assertion. That is why the majority did not want her 

here today. 

Because the majority has not called Simpson today, I ask unanimous consent to submit the transcript of her September 14, 2007, 

interview with the Judiciary Committee staff. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. FORBES. Now, in an attempt to keep this so-called investigation afloat, the majority has turned its attention to other outrageous claims. Today, our Committee has turned into a political 

circus when we should be addressing issues of serious public concern. The American people hopefully will see this event for what 

it is, just one more in a string of dead-end political investigations, 

but at least the majority will succeed in one major thing. They will 

break yet another record. They will move their approval rating 

even lower than the 11 percent they currently have earned. 

And I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

And I would now like to recognize the Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law, the Honorable 

Linda Sa ́nchez who represents California’s 39th Congressional District. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

During the course of the U.S. attorney investigation, we have attempted to learn why nine talented U.S. attorneys were fired in the 

middle of Bush’s second term. While the answer to that question 

remains elusive, today, we will try to answer a different question, 

but a no less troubling question: Did the U.S. attorneys who were 

not fired, the so-called loyal Bushies, base Federal prosecutions on 

improper partisan purposes rather than on facts and law? 

This hearing, I would remind my colleagues, is about the single 

most important issue in the criminal justice system: whether the 

power of the prosecutor, the power to take away someone’s freedom, has been abused. The public must learn the full extent to 

which the Justice Department has been transformed into a political 

arm of the Bush administration. 

During former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’s tenure, nonpolitical Justice Department lawyers, such as assistant U.S. attorneys and immigration judges, were hired for jobs based on party 

affiliation and campaign contributions rather than because of their 

qualifications. Top members of Mr. Gonzales’s staff attended preelection White House political briefings led by Karl Rove and his 

aides. Mr. Gonzales authorized almost 900 people in the White 

House to have communications about ongoing civil and criminal investigations with at least 42 department officials. 

Some Federal indictments were timed so as to have a maximum 

impact on upcoming elections, and evidence suggests that nine U.S. 

attorneys were fired in part because they refused to make prosecutorial decisions for politically motivated reasons. This hearing will 

explore whether political considerations improperly influenced 

prosecutorial judgment in several cases across the county. 

In July, Chairman Conyers, Mr. Davis, Ms. Baldwin and I requested documents from the Justice Department on three alleged 

selective prosecutions that we believe require additional investigation. Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, Wisconsin State 

official Georgia Thompson, and Cyril Wecht, a prominent former 

Democratic coroner in Pittsburgh. Three months have passed since 

our original request, and we still do not have an adequate response 

from the department. 

While our document requests focus on three cases of alleged selective prosecution, several other cases have come to my attention 

195

since we started the U.S. attorney investigation. For example, the 

prosecutions of former Los Angeles City Councilman Martin Ludlow, Georgia State Senator Charles Walker, Pennsylvania State 

Senator Vince Fumo, Michigan Attorney General candidate Geoffrey N. Fieger, Puerto Rico Governor Anibal Acevedo Vila, and 

Democratic contributor Peter Palivos may warrant additional scrutiny and Committee action. 

At this time, I would ask unanimous consent to enter letters regarding the cases of Mr. Fieger, Mr. Palivos, Mr. Walker and Mr. 

Acevedo Vila into the record. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The information referred to follows:]

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Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Anecdotal concerns regarding alleged politically 

based select prosecutions have been reinforced by an academic 

study by Professor Donald Shields, a witness at today’s hearings, 

and John Cragan. The study found Federal prosecutors during the 

Bush administration have indicted Democratic officeholders far 

more frequently than their Republican counterparts. I look forward 

to hearing Professor Shields’ testimony today and to gaining a better understanding as to why Democrats are disproportionately targeted for Federal prosecution. 

I was encouraged that when Attorney General Nominee Michael 

Mukasey was asked about the role of politics in law enforcement 

decisions, he responded, ‘‘Partisan politics plays no part in either 

the bringing of charges or the timing of charges.’’ However, as we 

learn from the divergence of Mr. Gonzales’s initial public statement 

from his actions at the department, I will reserve judgment on Mr. 

Mukasey until we are certain that his actions reflect the interests 

of the American people rather than simply the President. 

I hope that, if confirmed, Mr. Mukasey will act quickly to remove 

the cloud of politicization over the Justice Department and help 

steer clear the department back to its core mission: to guarantee 

fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans. Ensuring that U.S. attorneys base prosecutions on legitimate crimes 

instead of political considerations would be a good start. The American people need to be assured that political calculations do not determine whether an individual is arrested or prosecuted. 

And with what, I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Ms. Sa ́nchez. 

And I would like to now recognize the Ranking Member of the 

Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law, the Honorable Christopher Cannon, who represents Utah’s Third Congressional District. 

Mr. CANNON. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

I would like to begin by asking unanimous consent to submit for 

the record correspondence between Commercial and Administrative 

Law and the Justice Department. There are three separate items 

here, and I do not think we need to identify them separately. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. CANNON. First of all, I would like to thank our witnesses for 

being here today. This is always difficult, and we appreciate your 

coming. 

To my colleagues on the Commercial and Administrative Law 

Subcommittee and the Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security 

Subcommittee, let me say that I, at least in one way, I am glad 

that we are here today. That is we do not often have a chance to 

sit together. So it is pleasant to have a joint hearing. 

As a preliminary matter, I would like to associate myself with 

the comments of the distinguished Ranking Member of the Crime 

Subcommittee, in particular his discussion about politics behind 

this kind of a hearing. And what I have heard so far from the other 

side appear to be these kinds of same wild allegations that we have 

looked at continuously, which have been in many particular cases 

dispelled and which remain a vast effort of time by this Committee, 

by the full Committee, by the Subcommittee on Commercial and 

Administrative Law in its oversight process of the U.S. attorney’s 

office. 

Let me just agree with my fellow Ranking Member that we ought 

to be thinking about what the effect of these hearings is on the 

stature of this Committee and our Subcommittees, and I might just 

add by way of a final note here, a precatory note, that we actually 

know why the U.S. attorneys were fired. The majority refuses to 

actually look at the facts behind it. But none of the allegations that 

have been so flagrantly thrown around have been shown to have 

any substance at all in the firing of the U.S. attorneys, and the 

damage done to the Justice Department, which I agree has been 

done, is in no small part a result of these unsubstantiated allegations, which can be made in the most flagrant fashion from the 

dais and yet are subject to cross-examination and dissipation when 

we have witnesses and testimony. 

I would just mark the sixth anniversary of September 11, 2001, 

and since that tragic day, we have witnessed bombings in Bali, the 

attack on the Madrid trains, the attack in London at the London 

subway, attempts on Heathrow and Glasgow airports. We witnessed the foiling of terror plots, for example, on inbound planes 

from France and Germany and elsewhere, and it is thanks to the 

heroic and incessant efforts of the Justice Department entities that 

we oversee as well as other agencies and our military, that it is the 

list of attacks we have foiled and terrorists we have destroyed that 

has grown longer, not the attacks on our soil. 

But, today, we are talking about our efforts and tools in the war 

on terror and the war on crime before the Crime Subcommittee, 

and we are not talking about issues of the prosperity and stability 

of our economy in the context of commercial and administrative 

law, as we would in our Subcommittee. Instead, we are once again 

talking about U.S. attorneys and selective prosecutions for political 

reasons. 

The Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee has 

spent an inordinate amount of time on this whole project over the 

course of this year, and what has come from the investigation is 

not much more than a sullied Department of Justice and a partisan 

whirlwind for the majority to push on the press in the battle to destabilize that agency. This witch hunt has never really found anyVerDate 0ct 09 2002 12:33 Mar 27, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00212 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\CRIME\102307A\38507.000 HJUD1 PsN: 38507
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thing that justified the Committee’s extraordinary expenditure of 

time, but it kept going. 

As one excursion after another has led nowhere, the majority has 

simply shifted the targets, changed the allegations and cast its 

wrecking ball anew, and so we find ourselves today perhaps at last 

at the logical conclusion of this irresponsible distortion of the oversight process. 

We are summoned by the majority to hold a hearing of these two 

important Subcommittees to what end? To turn the partisan lens 

on two pending criminal manners. One is on appeal. One is has not 

even yet come to trial. The department, of course, cannot appear 

to defend itself, the cases are pending, and our witnesses, Mr. 

Thornburgh and Mr. Jones, know that. The Members of these two 

Subcommittees know that. As a result, we are hard pressed to 

come to the truth. 

I contend we should not be here at all, and our premature inquiry promises nothing other than to undermine the criminal justice system and perhaps even produce a miscarriage of justice in 

these two cases, for every word that those who would attack the 

department for these two prosecutions uttered can be broadcast—

in fact, we have cameras here today that are broadcasting—reported in print or reported on the Web in the districts in which the 

trials will occur. This hearing will risk tainting the jury pools in 

those districts. This is an unfortunate use of Committee time and 

resources, and I do not intend to prolong it further by these comments. 

I hope at last when we get to the dead-end of all this, we can 

move on and help the Justice Department reclaim its appropriate 

role in society. 

And so with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Mr. Cannon. 

We have a vote pending, but we would like to complete the statements. So I will call on the Chairman of the full Judiciary Committee, the Honorable John Conyers, who represents Michigan’s 

14th Congressional District. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you, Chairman. 

I want to welcome the witnesses personally, and I suppose I 

could best use my time by presenting and defending the tremendously important record of the Judiciary Committee. I am not going 

to do that because I have been weaving, as the longest-serving 

Member and maybe the oldest, a thread through this that runs 

something like this. 

First of all, this is about the Department of Justice, and it is 

about the assistant U.S. attorneys. And we have a real surplus of 

them here. I mean, this Committee is very expertly organized 

around, first of all, our staff. Mike Volkov, Rob Reid, Mark 

Dubester have all served with distinction in the Department of 

Justice. In the full Committee among the Members, we have Artur 

Davis; we have Mr. Schiff, an assistant U.S. attorney from California; we have Zoe Lofgren, a district attorney; and we also have 

Bill Delahunt, a district attorney from Massachusetts. So that is 

the level of research and organizing that has been going on. 

Now going along with that thread that encompasses the experience in this room, we have three attorney generals, one is Dan 

208

Lungren. Although he is a state attorney general, he is the only 

one we have, and we are proud of that. What I remember best 

about Dan Lungren when he was the attorney general of the largest state in the union is that he said that character is doing what 

is right when no one is looking, and I think that is marked the way 

he has approached our activity across the years. 

The second person I would bring to your attention is the Attorney General in the 1940’s, Robert Jackson, who did a lot of other 

things beside be Attorney General, but, you know, when he was addressing the Attorney Generals back in the 1940’s, he made some 

observations that our Chairman, Bobby Scott, referenced, and I 

want to just remind you how important the job is. 

So he talked about how much power U.S. attorneys have. He was 

addressing a conference of U.S. attorneys, and he said that they 

have more power than almost anybody else in government and, if 

it is misused, it has horrible ramifications, and it is in that sense 

that he is quoted liberally throughout this hearing and our preparation for it. 

And then the third Attorney General is the one that sits before 

us today. You see, I was around when Mr. Thornburgh was the Attorney General, and he came in under some very difficult circumstances. There were some big problems which he had to address, and he did it in a fashion that reminds me of why he is here 

today. This is not an accident. He is still pursuing the ability as 

when he was an attorney to make the Department of Justice and 

those that serve in it, the U.S. attorneys and everybody else, as accountable and as independent and as impartial as is humanly possible, and it is that that guides us in this hearing. 

What makes me proud is that most of the Members of this Committee can avoid the notion of dipping into partisanship. It is very 

tempting to do in a legislative arena, but we do not do that. We 

are mostly trying to improve the justice system. Our hearings here 

follow the U.S. attorneys’ firing, I mean, because one of the problems of the politicization of the Department of Justice was the 

abuse of prosecutorial authority, and that is what brings us here. 

So, ladies and gentlemen, there is a very logical and reasonable 

line of approach here. We want to build the Department of Justice 

up. We want it to gain the confidence that it has enjoyed in the 

past, and our best way to do it is to shine light on the problem 

areas so they will not happen ever again. 

I am happy that we have done that, and these hearings are 

unique. The Members are absolutely correct this has never been 

done before, and I am proud of the fact that it is being done on my 

watch because we think that by examining the problems, we are 

going to be able to come together and move forward, and so I commend the multiplicity of Chairmen and Ranking Members that are 

gathered here this morning, and I am so happy to see the witnesses, and I thank the gentleman. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

We have just a few moments left on the vote. We will recess the 

Committee hearing. It will be approximately 10 minutes. We will 

be right back. 

[Recess.] 

Mr. SCOTT. The hearing will come to order. 

209

We have a distinguished panel of experts from whom we will 

hear testimony today. 

Our first witness is the Honorable Richard Thornburgh of the 

law firm of Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis. Mr. 

Thornburgh serves as an active advisor and counselor to the firm’s 

government affairs clients with respect to matters concerning federal, state and local governments. He served as governor of Pennsylvania, United States attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, and was the Attorney General for the United States 

under President Reagan and under President George Herbert 

Walker Bush. He has a bachelor’s degree from Yale and an LLB 

from the University of Pittsburgh Law School. 

The next witness will be Donald Shields, professor emeritus at 

the University of Missouri at St. Louis. He has conducted extensive 

research and authored a document entitled An Empirical Examination of the Political Profiling of Elected Officials: A Report on Selective Investigations and-or Indictments by DOJ’s U. S. Attorneys 

under Attorneys General Ashcroft and Gonzales. He has a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree from the University of Missouri 

and a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. 

Our final witness will be Mr. Douglas Jones from the law firm 

of Whatley, Drake and Kallas. He served as U.S. attorney for the 

Northern District of Alabama from 1997 to 2001, and since entering private practice, he has been appointed as a special attorney 

general for the State of Alabama. He holds a bachelor’s degree from 

the University of Alabama, a juris doctorate from Cumberland Law 

School at Stanford University. 

Mr. Thornburgh? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Chairman Scott——

Mr. SCOTT. Excuse me. 

As you will note the lights before you, we are asking our witnesses to do the best they can to confine their testimony to 5 minutes. The light will go from green to yellow to red, which will indicate that the time is up. 

I am sorry. 

Mr. Thornburgh? 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE RICHARD THORNBURGH, 

KIRKPATRICK AND LOCKHART PRESTON GATES ELLIS, LLP, 

WASHINGTON, DC 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Thank you. 

Chairman Scott, Chairman Conyers, Chairwoman Sa ́nchez, 

Ranking Member Forbes and other Members of the Committee and 

Subcommittees, thank you for the opportunity to speak to you 

today about the significant dangers and serious harm that can be 

caused by the politicizing of Federal criminal investigations and 

prosecutions by the U.S. Justice Department. 

First and foremost, let me affirm my own belief that politics has 

no place in the decision-making process of whether or not to charge 

citizens of the United States with any crime—federal or otherwise. 

These citizens must have confidence that the Department of Justice 

is conducting itself in a fair and impartial manner without actual 

political influence or the appearance of political influence. Unfortunately, that may no longer be the case. 

210

Let me begin by stating that I come before you as an advocate 

representing Dr. Cyril Wecht, the former elected coroner of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, who is currently under indictment in 

the Western District of Pennsylvania and in which proceedings my 

firm represents him. 

Although the indictment contains 84 counts, it is not the type of 

case normally constituting a Federal corruption case brought 

against a local official. There is no allegation that Dr. Wecht ever 

solicited or received a bribe or kickback. There is no allegation that 

Dr. Wecht traded on a conflict of interest in conducting the affairs 

of his elected office. None of the traditional indicia of public corruption are presented in this case. 

Instead, the prosecution of Dr. Wecht seeks to use the unprecedented theories which seek to convert a hodgepodge of alleged violations of home rule charters, county codes and state ethic provisions into Federal felonies. Many of these alleged underlying violations do not even carry state-mandated penalties, yet are now utilized as a vehicle for Federal felony prosecutions which brand the 

accused as a corrupt public servant. 

A detailed summary of the shortcomings in these charges is set 

forth in my written statement, especially at pages four and five, 

which I ask be made part of the record. 

Suffice it to say, most of the charging accounts allege what I 

would call nickel-and-dime transgressions which are sought to be 

converted into Federal felony charges. Some of these counts involve, for example, the use of office fax machines for personal business, such as the transmission of Dr. Wecht’s curriculum vitae and 

fee schedule to a local public defender seeking his assistance and 

an executed contract for a teaching engagement, postal charges for 

mailing histological slides to attorneys in black lung cases who had 

consulted Dr. Wecht and expense billing irregularities in invoices 

mailed to Dr. Wecht’s private clients, a number of felony counts derived from alleged improper billing for use of a county car while 

traveling to outlying counties to assist local prosecutors and coroners. 

Astonishingly, the government’s own evidence indicates that they 

knew prior to indictment that an audit of the billings of Dr. Wecht 

of the counties in question showed them to be 99.99 percent accurate, a record that was nonetheless turned into 37 separate felony 

counts covering a total of $1,700, and the list goes on. 

What has come to pass is the realization of the often-expressed 

fear that the generality and ambiguity of the mail fraud statutes 

could be used to expand Federal jurisdiction so far into matters of 

state government that it could be used, as one judge put it, to regulate theft of pencils from an office supply cabinet. The Congress 

might fairly be asked: Is that what you intended? 

A similar expansion of Title 18 USC 666(a)(1)(A) charges that Dr. 

Wecht, in each year from 2001 to 2005, stole property valued at 

$5,000 or more, charges not based on a classic theft required by 

law, but on Dr. Wecht’s use of county personnel, equipment, resources and, yes, space of the coroner’s office to assist in his private 

business. We thus found ourselves asking, ‘‘Why would the U .S. 

attorney’s office for the Western District of Pennsylvania attempt 

to make such a stretch of Federal law?′′

211

With that background, we came to learn, in part from your Committee’s investigation, as well as from various news accounts, that 

the Department of Justice, in its evaluation of its prosecutors, in 

certain cases, fired U.S. attorneys not for performance-based reasons, but for political ones. We came to learn that those United 

States attorneys, who, among other things, aggressively pursued 

Democrats, as opposed to those who did not, remained in place or 

were promoted. In fact, we learned from the study conducted by 

Messrs. Shields and Cragan that this Administration is seven 

times more likely to prosecute Democrats than Republicans. 

Possessed of that information, the prosecution of Dr. Cyril Wecht 

takes on a different and troubling light. Dr. Wecht is a prominent 

and highly visible Democrat in the predominantly Democratic region of the Western District of Pennsylvania. He is known nationally and internationally as one of the world’s leading forensic pathologists. He often speaks and is retained to conduct autopsies in 

some of the country’s highest profile cases. 

In addition to Dr. Wecht’s renown in the area of forensic pathology, he has always been a contentious, outspoken, highly critical 

and highly visible Democratic figure in Western Pennsylvania. In 

other words, he would qualify as an ideal target for a Republican 

U .S. attorney trying to curry favor with a department which demonstrated that if you play by its rules, you will advance. Ms. Buchanan must have observed this phenomenon firsthand during her 

service as the director of the executive office of U.S. Attorneys. 

Dr. Wecht’s case, although high profile, was not the only apparent political prosecution in Western Pennsylvania. In addition to 

Dr. Wecht, U.S. Attorney Buchanan conducted highly visible grand 

jury investigations of the former Democratic mayor of Pittsburgh 

Tom Murphy, and Peter DeFazio, the former Democratic sheriff of 

Allegheny County in which Pittsburgh is situated. She also prosecuted some lesser-known Democratic Party members in the sheriff’s office. 

It should also be noted that of these three high-profile, very public, Democratic prosecutions, one resulted in a misdemeanor 

macing plea, one resulted in no plea and an alternative resolution, 

and Dr. Wecht’s case remains pending. All three Democrats were 

front-page stories during the run-up to the 2006 elections 

During this same period, not one Republican officeholder was investigated and-or prosecuted by Ms. Buchanan’s office—not one. Although a whistleblower in Republican Congressman Tim Murphy’s 

office accused the congressman of using paid staff members in his 

election campaign, no investigation was conducted that we are 

aware of. Despite a local outcry that former Republican Senator 

Rick Santorum was defrauding a local community by claiming residency when he actually resided in Virginia for purposes of having 

the school district pay for his children’s cyberschooling, we are 

aware of no investigation being conducted. 

I cannot and do not opine on the merits of either case, but the 

fact that no investigation was undertaken stands out when Democrats in the Western District of Pennsylvania have been investigated and indicted in such a highly visible manner. 

This stands in stark——

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Chairman, point of order. 

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Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman——

Mr. Thornburgh, could you summarize quickly the rest of your 

testimony? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I am about through, Mr. Chairman, and will 

do my best. 

We have set forth in our written statement to which I refer, once 

more, concerns we have about the conduct of the case agent, FBI 

agent in this case, and I will refer you to that. 

One might argue that Dr. Wecht is entitled to a day in court, and 

he will have that day. But the public’s perception of apparent politics at the Department of Justice will not easily be changed or remedied, no matter the outcome of his trial. Sally Kalson, a veteran 

columnist for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, wrote in her column of 

July 22, 2007, ‘‘An ambitious and enthusiastic Bush partisan like 

U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan might well consider Dr. Wecht 

a plum target, good for many brownie points at the White House.’’ 

She further wrote, ‘‘The jury has yet to convene on Dr. Wecht, but 

the verdict on the Bush administration is loud and clear: 100 percent political.’’

This is the unfortunate manner in which this Department of Justice is viewed in the Western District of Pennsylvania. 

We should not allow any citizen of the United States to proceed 

to trial knowing that his prosecution may have been undertaken 

for political reasons as opposed to being done to serve the interests 

of justice. Sadly, that appears to have been so in the case against 

Dr. Wecht. 

And I thank you for the extended opportunity to appear before 

you today. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Thornburgh follows:]

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE RICHARD THORNBURGH


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Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Mr. Thornburgh. 

Professor Shields? 

TESTIMONY OF DONALD SHIELDS, PROFESSOR,

UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI-ST. LOUIS, KANSAS CITY, MO 

Mr. SHIELDS. Mr. Chairman, thank you for this opportunity. 

First, you may be wondering how a communication professor 

comes before Congress with information about political abuses of 

the Justice Department, and I want to tell you that that is a valid 

question. 

At the University of Minnesota where I received my Ph.D., Dr. 

Ernest Bormann developed a communication theory called symbolic 

convergence. Communication, including political communication, 

consists of dramatized messages that, when shared by other people, 

can turn into a rhetorical vision that catches up large groups of 

people into a similar symbolic reality. 

Now symbolic reality may have nothing to do with actual reality. 

To cite a famous example, Barry Goldwater in 1964 was not actually a dangerous warmonger. 

For three decades or more, I have studied and applied symbolic 

convergence theory to political messaging on a national level. With 

the collapse of Communism, a real question arose as to what would 

replace anti-Communism as the dominant rhetorical theme among 

American conservatives. Then when John Ashcroft became Attorney General, he announced a major DOJ initiative against public 

corruption. The study I report to you began as a means of tracking 

participation in this new neoconservative anti-corruption rhetorical 

vision. 

To do the tracking, I compiled a list of the publicly reported Federal investigations and indictments of elected officials. I went beyond the national media to the local media, and that proved the 

key that unlocked Pandora’s box. By accident, I made the discovery 

that the Justice Department, acting below the radar of the national 

media, was investigating and indicting local Democratic officials at 

a rate much higher, and local Republican officials at a rate much 

lower, than the percentage of each in the population of elected officials, and the DOJ continues to do so throughout 2007. 

Nationally, the party affiliation of elected officials is roughly 50 

percent Democrat, 41 percent Republican, and 9 percent Independent. These national percentages are closely reflected in my 

control group study of the investigation and arrests of 251 elected 

officials and candidates by nonfederal law enforcement at the state 

and local level. These investigation rates mirror the national percentages of 50 percent Democrat, 41 percent Republican, and 9 percent Independent-Other. 

When I began my study of the U.S. attorneys, these were the results I anticipated, that is no significant difference between the observed percentages and the actual percentages. 

To the contrary, however, when it comes to investigation and indictment of local officials by the DOJ, the numbers are staggeringly 

disproportionate: 80 percent Democrats, 14 percent Republicans, 6 

percent Independent. That is 5.6 Democrats investigated for each 

Republican, 5.6 to 1, when the ratio should be 1.2 to 1, and that 

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is out of 820 investigations now, Mr. Chairman, not the 375 you 

referred to. 

These numbers speak clearly that Federal investigations and 

prosecutions of local officials are highly disproportionate, so much 

so that the possibility of such a difference occurring by chance exceeds the .0001 level. That is less than one chance in 10,000. 

So there is political bias—I call it political profiling—in such selective investigation and prosecution rates. The question that could 

not be answered until now concerns whether the bias has been a 

bias of individual prosecutors or a policy-driven bias. Both biases 

translate into the selective investigation and prosecution, however. 

And the numbers do not lie. They represent real people with real 

faces, people like Puerto Rico’s Governor Anibal Vila; Alabama’s 

former Governor Don Siegelman; Allegheny County, Pennsylvania’s 

former coroner Cyril Wecht; Michigan’s former attorney general 

candidate Jeffrey Fieger; Michigan’s Carl Marlinga, a prosecutor 

and congressional candidate; or Mississippi Supreme Court Justice 

Oliver Diaz, Jr. 

Each of these investigations and indictments were suspect. The 

anecdotal stories and facts behind these cases need to be told. They 

and others like them show both the tenacity and the zeal with 

which the DOJ has selectively investigated and selectively prosecuted Democrats, elected officials and candidates. 

Other recent revelations concerning the firing of a number of 

U.S. attorneys for not prosecuting Democrats or for prosecuting Republicans would seem to indicate that the political profiling is very 

much a policy-driven bias coming directly from the Office of the Attorney General and perhaps even the White House. 

Regardless of the origin of political profiling and regardless of the 

party being targeted, Congress, I think, has the obligation to protect against this abuse. Because the powers of Federal law enforcement are so great and the political abuse of those powers so unspeakably dangerous, Congress must act. My written statement 

provides several suggestions for Congress to consider. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Shields follows:]

226

PREPARED STATEMENT OF DONALD C. SHIELDS


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Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Professor. 

Attorney Jones? 

TESTIMONY OF G. DOUGLAS JONES, ESQUIRE, WHATLEY, 

DRAKE AND KALLAS, BIRMINGHAM, AL 

Mr. JONES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

It is a privilege to be back. I testified before Chairman Scott’s 

Committee earlier this summer on the Till bill which I still hope 

will pass both Houses so that we can further investigate and prosecute the unsolved crimes of the Civil Rights era. 

For today, we are here on a much more disturbing topic that, I 

believe, has significantly damaged the credibility of the Department of Justice, and that is the role of partisan politics in recent 

criminal investigations. I want to echo what my colleague at the 

other end of the table, former Republican Attorney General Dick 

Thornburgh, said. Partisan politics plays no role in either the investigation, the prosecution or the timing of cases, and, unfortunately, that does not appear to be the case with the current Administration. 

Mr. Chairman, I have submitted a lengthier written testimony 

that I know will be made part of the record. I would like to just 

spend a few moments to sum up the timeline of the Governor 

Siegelman investigation that goes back to 1999 at a time when I 

was still a United States attorney. 

Governor Siegelman, who had been a force in Alabama politics, 

probably the most dominant force in state politics as a Democrat 

since he first took office in 1978, was elected governor in 1998 and 

assumed office in January 1999, and it seemed that no sooner had 

he taken office that certain investigators and lawyers and the attorney general’s office of the State of Alabama targeted him for investigation. 

Now, ultimately, those charges brought against a Siegelman supporter in 2001 did not include Governor Siegelman. In fact, he was 

not named as a co-conspirator, and his name was rarely mentioned 

even in the trial. 

But it was in 2001 and 2002 that a separate investigation also 

started. It was being prosecuted jointly with the U.S. attorney’s office out of Montgomery. The allegations involved corruption among 

one of Governor Siegelman’s Cabinet members, Nick Bailey, and a 

supporter named Lanny Young. 

Clearly, those two individuals had committed crimes. It was bribery that Nick Bailey testified to that Governor Siegelman had no 

knowledge about, but very quickly the investigation turned the 

crosshairs on to Governor Siegelman. 

I did not represent Governor Siegelman at the time. I did not 

begin to represent him until 2003, following the death of his counsel, David Johnson, but one of the first things that we did in 2003 

was to visit with the U.S. attorney’s office and the Alabama attorney general to discuss the case, to tell them that we did not believe 

that politics should be involved in this case, but we were concerned 

about timing and that this case needed to move forward. Governor 

Siegelman had lost the election in 2002 and now was very obviously going to run again in 2006. 

272

We were assured that it would not, and I believed that. I believed it then, and I believe it today, that at that point politics may 

not have played a role. There were allegations that needed to be 

looked at and, as a prosecutor, I know that you have to look at serious allegations no matter who it is. 

But in 2004, all of a sudden, a case that had originated in 1999 

and resulted in a conviction of Dr. Bobo and had been reversed 

came back and, for the first time, Governor Siegelman is included 

in an indictment out of the clear blue sky. It came as a complete 

shock to us that Don Siegelman was included in May of 2004 in 

that indictment as a co-conspirator with Dr. Bobo. 

I detail this more in my statement, my written statement, Mr. 

Chairman. 

The case is ultimately dismissed. I was recused in that case, but 

continued to work on the case out of Montgomery. 

In the summer of 2004, while the case in Birmingham was pending, we met with U.S. attorneys in Montgomery. We were told at 

that time that they had written off most all of the charges that had 

been looked at for 2 years or more against Governor Siegelman, 

that they had narrowed their focus to three charges, including one 

that involved Mr. Scrushy. They wanted us to extend the statute 

of limitations because they had just not quite got the evidence they 

needed, which we did, we gladly did, because we were convinced 

that there was no crime and that no amount of time would result 

in finding evidence to support a crime. This was in July of 2004. 

We did not extend the statute of limitations again, although we 

were asked to do that. Instead, I continued to call. We were promised in the summer of 2004 that an answer would be given to us 

within the month, that they would make a decision, that the case 

needed to move. It came and went. The month came and went. I 

kept calling. 

What is interesting is that in October of 2004, the case in Birmingham was dismissed. Governor Siegelman’s case was thrown 

out on a motion of the government after an adverse ruling by 

Judge Clemens. A month later, in November of 2004, I again had 

discussions with the assistant U.S. attorney in Montgomery. At 

that time, we were told very specifically that they had had a meeting in Washington and that Washington had told them to go back 

and review the case top to bottom. 

What resulted in 2005 was not, Mr. Chairman, simply a review 

of the case. It was a wholesale renewed investigation, casting wider 

nets, subpoenaing more records, allegations that were off the table 

were back on, new allegations that came forward that ultimately 

resulted in charges. All of this was absolutely stunning and a complete reversal of what we had been told only a few months before. 

I ultimately did not represent Governor Siegelman at trial because of a trial conflict that I had in Birmingham, but there is no 

question in my mind the Department of Justice in Washington 

were integrally involved, despite the statements made by the acting 

U.S. attorney in Montgomery. The case was working out of Washington. They were an integral part of the case. I think the evidence 

clearly demonstrates that. 

Mr. Chairman, finally, as a wrap-up, let me just say that I understand that here in Washington and within the beltway, this 

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hearing would appear to be driven by politics, but I can assure you, 

as is attested to by the fact that you have both a Republican and 

a Democrat on this panel, that across the country, people who have 

worked in the Department of Justice are concerned, and they see 

a disturbing trend and a trend that involves partisan politics that 

should never be the case. 

Resources have to be used appropriately and, in this case, Mr. 

Chairman, when partisan politics are involved, it will undermine 

the entire credibility of the system, taint any jury verdict that 

could come out and erode the confidence of the public. It is as I 

said in my statement. 

Dr. King once said that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice 

everywhere, and that, I think, is happening across the country 

today, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Jones follows:]

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Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

And I thank all of our witnesses for their testimonies. As has 

been suggested, the full written statements in their entirety will be 

entered into the record. 

I would like to enter into the record a petition in support of urging the United States Congress to investigate the circumstances 

surrounding the investigation, prosecution, sentencing and detention of Don Siegelman, the former governor of Alabama, that is 

signed by 44 former state attorneys general urging the Congress to 

take that action. 

Without objection, that will be placed in the record. 

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Thornburgh, we cut your testimony off. Was 

there more that you wanted to say. I think you were about to talk 

about the FBI agent. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. If I could just take a minute to summarize my 

testimony, it is set forth at length in my written statement, but one 

troubling aspect of this investigation and prosecution and I think 

further evidence that it was motivated by something other than a 

search for justice relates to the conduct of FBI Agent Bradley 

Orsini, the lead agent assigned to Dr. Wecht’s case, as well as the 

case against the former mayor, and an agent with an unseemly 

past. 

Agent Orsini, while in Newark, New Jersey, was investigated for 

years by the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility and found 

to have falsified official records and FBI Form 302s. He was reprimanded twice for falsification of evidence spanning years, demoted and suspended without pay for 30 days and placed on probation for a year before transferring to Pittsburgh in September 2004. 

There are currently motions pending regarding Orsini’s actions 

in connection with three highly publicized warrants he obtained in 

this case, an admitted violation of Department of Justice policy. 

Following disclosure of his past reprimands for serial falsification 

of evidence, at the mandate of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, 

prosecutors told three different Federal courts that they do not 

wish to sponsor Orsini as a witness and went so far as to attempt 

to prevent us from even bringing up his role at trial. This, we suggest, is further evidence of irregularities in the conduct of the investigation and prosecution of this case. 

One final troubling incident, Mr. Chairman, at the news conference announcing the indictment of Dr. Wecht, the United States 

attorney touted the 84-count indictment against Dr. Wecht, but 

then added that he had in her own words literally provided unclaimed cadavers to a local Catholic university in exchange for lab 

space, an allegation we will prove to be totally false and unfounded 

at trial and which was never even discussed in the pre-indictment 

meetings we had with Ms. Buchanan and her staff. 

Predictably, Dr. Wecht, the Democrat scientist and educator, was 

forthwith labeled a body snatcher and a media feeding frenzy ensued. The U.S. attorney thus succeeded in the department’s apparent mission of casting Democrats in a negative light during the 

election year. 

This, it seems to me, as part of the cumulative record here, indicates a failure and breakdown in the supervision of the conduct of 

this investigation and prosecution, and we bring it to the Committee’s attention for that purpose. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

When you were Attorney General under two different Presidents, 

could you tell us about the number of people in the Department of 

Justice that could communicate with numbers of people in the 

White House and what implications that has in terms of limiting 

the politicization of the Justice Department? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Primary vehicle for communication between 

the White House and the Department of Justice was communications between myself and the White House counsel who was then 

C. Boyden Gray. 

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I made a rather strict rule about the department speaking with 

one voice and, unless otherwise exempted in a particular case, that 

voice to the Administration, to the news media and, indeed, to the 

Congress was to be the Attorney General. Now, obviously, for practical reasons, that was not always the case, but any conduct with 

the White House in particular would be subject to review by our 

office. 

Mr. SCOTT. And what implications did that have on politicization 

of charging decisions? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. It was designed to have a prophylactic effect 

to prevent anyone with designs upon affecting department investigations from attempting to contact people in the Department of 

Justice. We had a couple of instances where we learned of that and 

apprised the White House accordingly that that was not the way 

that we intended to conduct the business of the Department of Justice. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. My time is about up. 

I yield to the gentleman from Virginia. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Thornburgh, thank you for being here today. You have heard 

so many people compliment you on your great record of public service to this country, and we certainly thank you for that. 

But taking your own words today, you said you are here today 

as an advocate for Dr. Wecht, and I assume that your firm represents Dr. Wecht. I think that was your testimony. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Yes, we do. Yes. 

Mr. FORBES. And you do not represent him as a part of that public service. You are representing him for compensation, your firm 

is. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Exactly. 

Mr. FORBES. Isn’t that correct? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. We are engaged——

Mr. FORBES. And you are paid for that? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Exactly. 

Mr. FORBES. Now you suggest that these charges should not have 

been brought against Dr. Wecht. They were brought in a Federal 

court, as I understand it. Is that correct? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. They were indeed. 

Mr. FORBES. And did your firm file a motion to dismiss in that 

matter? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. We did. 

Mr. FORBES. And a Federal judge heard that case? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Yes. 

Mr. FORBES. He was not the prosecutor, was he? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I am sorry? 

Mr. FORBES. The Federal judge was not the prosecutor, was he? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. No. 

Mr. FORBES. And he heard your written statements and he heard 

whatever arguments you made and he denied your motion to dismiss. Is that correct? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. That is correct. 

Mr. FORBES. So he basically disagreed with you that the charges 

should not have been brought. In addition to that, this case is set 

for trial in January. Is that correct? 

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Mr. THORNBURGH. That is correct. 

Mr. FORBES. The prosecutor could not very well come here today 

and testify on any of the contrary facts that he might have because 

if he did that, wouldn’t that be unethical for him, and wouldn’t that 

certainly lead to the appearance of him politicizing this issue by 

coming here and setting forth those claims in a forum like this? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Under department rules, that is true, although I understand that the United States attorney has testified 

in secret to this Committee. 

Mr. FORBES. Well, there is a difference between testifying perhaps if you are required to testify somewhere else and between in 

a public forum like this, isn’t it? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Well, it is, indeed, but on occasion, when I 

was Attorney General and when I was myself a U.S. attorney, testimony was given to Committees of Congress who had a legitimate 

oversight interest in particular matters——

Mr. FORBES. Well——

Mr. THORNBURGH [continuing]. And that rule is not a hard-set 

rule. 

Mr. FORBES. So then you would suggest it would have been more 

appropriate if the Democratic majority actually called her in to answer questions to them? You would suggest that it would have 

been better for the prosecutor to be able to come in a public hearing like this before the case was tried in January to talk about the 

case? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I think in this instance where the Committee 

has expressed such a high degree of interest in the circumstances 

surrounding this prosecution, that might be appropriate. I do not 

know what her testimony was. I am merely responding, at your request, at this Committee’s request——

Mr. FORBES. Well, we have not finished——

Mr. THORNBURGH [continuing]. To present the point of view of a 

person charged with a highly irregular pattern of crimes. We will 

argue the case to the jury and defend this individual——

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Thornburgh, my time—I do not have quite the 

same privilege that you do. I will be cut to 5 minutes. So I am just 

going to say I understand you will argue that case. I think that is 

appropriate to do. I would just be very concerned if the attorney 

trying this case came here and presented all these facts and discussed it today. I think that would be highly inappropriate for her, 

and I think we end up not having that. 

Mr. Shields, in your report—and let me just make sure I am correct here—by your own study, you put, ‘‘This is not a longitudinal 

study.’’ I am sorry. ‘‘This longitudinal study is not a legal study. 

It does not purport to track the actual case history of any individual, other than as it may have been reported in the news story 

or the Federal press release.’’ Is that true? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes, that is true. 

Mr. FORBES. So you based yours on the press release? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, no, the Justice Department will not release 

the data on cases. Mr. Congressman, as you well know, the Justice 

Department will not release the data on the actual investigations 

and——

Mr. FORBES. In fact——

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Mr. SHIELDS [continuing]. Who they are investigating, but——

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Shields, my time is about out, but we just had 

a hearing last week, and one of the witnesses came up and said, 

‘‘Thank you for at least pointing out that prosecutors oftentimes 

cannot disclose all the information.’’ Oftentimes, the information is 

not disclosed out of there, but one of the things——

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, if they had not——

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Shields, you can respond to anybody else. I do 

not have much time. I have about 30 seconds. 

Mr. SHIELDS. Okay. 

Mr. FORBES. But we had some investigations by the Justice Department. You have Robert Nell. You got Jack Abramoff. You got 

David Safavian . You got Neal Volz. You got Tony Rudy. You got 

Roger Stillwell. And we hear a lot of people come in and say, ‘‘Look 

at all this corruption by the Republicans,’’ and I am sure some of 

them felt that that was improper and wrong, too. 

Mr. Jones, I do not have much time to ask you any questions, 

but I know that when the initial allegation against Governor 

Siegelman were brought up, you were the U.S. attorney at that 

time—is that correct—or at some point in time when those allegations——

Mr. JONES. In the Bobo investigation, they were never brought 

up. What I said in my statement was an assistant attorney general 

for the state hoped they were going to go that far. It never came 

up. So——

Mr. FORBES. But you subsequently testified you are a longtime 

friend of Governor Siegelman’s, right? 

Mr. JONES. Oh, yes. Yes. 

Mr. FORBES. And at one point in time, you were trying a case, 

and did the court ask you to stop? 

Mr. JONES. Well, after the Bobo case was reversed and came 

back and Governor Siegelman was, in my opinion, shockingly included in that, I sought to continue to represent him. I was his 

lawyer at that time, but because I had initially agreed that the 

early Bobo case that did not include Siegelman come to my district, 

Judge Clemens felt that that would not be appropriate for me to 

represent him. 

Mr. FORBES. So you disagreed with him, but the judge told you 

that you could not represent him in that case? 

Mr. JONES. Yes. 

Mr. FORBES. And also you have given significant campaign contributions to Federal candidates across the country, Democrats, including Members on this Committee, correct? 

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FORBES. Okay. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you for your patience. My time has expired. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

The gentlelady from California? 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Thank you. 

Mr. Thornburgh, you served as the U.S. attorney for the Western 

District of Pennsylvania, the very district in which Dr. Wecht is 

charged with corruption. Is that correct? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. That is correct. 

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Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Okay. In your testimony, you mentioned that his 

indictment is not one which normally constitutes a corruption case. 

What would a normal corruption case resemble, and is there a 

threshold of activity that you looked for when you were the U.S. 

attorney in bringing those types of charges? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. The normal type of corruption, in my view, is 

where there is a bribery case, an extortion case, a conflict of interest that gives rise to some financial gain for an officeholder, as distinguished from a series of minor irregularities that are apparent 

in this case that under a broad reading of the Federal mail fraud 

and theft of services statutes have attempted to be converted into 

Federal felonies, and that is what brought my attention to this case 

and these aspects I have discussed this morning. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. So, in your opinion, the case that is brought 

against Dr. Wecht is not the typical kind of corruption case that 

you hear about in the news headlines about——

Mr. THORNBURGH. Absolutely. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ [continuing]. People taking bribes, quid pro quos or 

favors or those types of things? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Absolutely. They all relate, I might add, to the 

conduct of his outside business, a practice that is expressly condoned by the authority under which he holds office. There is nothing sinister about him holding public office and doing the outside 

business, and——

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. In fact, that outside business sometimes helped 

prosecutors in some of the counties? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. In large part, he was engaged by prosecutors 

in outlying counties, more rural counties where they did not have 

the forensic pathology capability available, and he did that not only 

in Pennsylvania, but across the Nation and, in fact, in major highprofile cases because of the wide respect that he has attained. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. I am interested in getting at the particulars of this 

case. I have read your written testimony, and you indicated that 

the U.S. attorney’s office in the Western District of Pennsylvania 

has taken an overly expansive view of Federal criminal jurisdiction 

to effectively transform common events in the public workplace into 

Federal felonies, and one of the examples, if you could just refresh 

my memory, involved faxes and a total net worth of about—the 

number of $24 sticks in my mind. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Well, I do not know what the exact amount 

befixed on the use of a fax machine, but, in point of fact, a number 

of the counts in this indictment relate to Dr. Wecht’s alleged use 

of a county fax machine to send his curriculum vitae or to send his 

fee schedules or to send reports to some of those agencies for which 

he had done outside work or to other sources that had requested 

him to speak. He is widely known as a speaker on these issues. 

And each one of those illicit, supposedly, uses of the fax machine 

is charged as a felony in this indictment. It does not make any 

sense. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. I would agree with you. I think that most people 

occasionally use a fax machine in their office to conduct stuff that 

perhaps is not directly related to their work, but——

Mr. THORNBURGH. It is probably not ethical, but hardly a Federal 

felony. 

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Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. A Federal felony. How would you suggest that 

Congress change the law so that public corruption cases are based 

on evidence of criminal activity rather than ordinary types of 

events in the public workplace? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I think a review of the type suggested by 

Judge Easterbrook and cited in my written statement would be in 

order of these statutes that are so loose in their potential application, notably section 666 and 1346, which he said have an openended quality to them that permits prosecutors to kind of define 

the crime themselves. I think the Congress ought, in its oversight 

function, to examine precisely how those statutes have been interpreted and to tighten them up, and——

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. So that we are not charging people with Federal 

felonies for taking pencils home from their workplace? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Exactly. Exactly. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. In your written testimony, you also indicate that 

the public’s perception of apparent politics at the Department of 

Justice will not be easily changed or remedied. I am interested in 

knowing what steps could the Attorney General take to change the 

public perception that improper political considerations are being 

injected into prosecutorial decision-making at the Department of 

Justice. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I think an important step has already been 

taken in that regard with the appointment, subject to Senate confirmation, of Judge Michael McCasey, a widely respected jurist who 

has experience in the Department of Justice and who, as noted 

here today, at his hearing testified that partisan politics should 

play no part in either bringing of charges or the timing of charges, 

and the timing is important as well, as we pointed out in our statement, that these cases were all brought against Democrats in the 

run-up to the 2006 election. 

But Judge McCasey has clearly indicated his concern over these 

allegations, over the image of the department, over the integrity 

and reputation of the department, and I think he will ask for and 

deserves the support of your Committee and its counterparts in the 

other House. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Thornburgh. 

I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

The gentleman from Florida, Mr. Keller? 

Mr. KELLER. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Thornburgh, I do not know if Dr. Wecht is guilty or not. I 

do know that the Federal judge will ensure that the trial is conducted based on witnesses with personal knowledge, documents 

which are authenticated and admissible evidence. 

Your testimony is that there is a perception of an appearance 

that Dr. Wecht may have been prosecuted for being a Democrat because the prosecutor might be trying to please the White House, 

possibly to advance her own career. Your testimony, to be blunt, is 

the most pathetic example of speculation and innuendo and hearsay that I have seen in 7 years on this Committee. 

I think it is totally ridiculous to imply that the President of the 

United States would call up a United States attorney and say, 

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erably a dog catcher or coroner, and prosecute the hell out of them 

to help us keep the U.S. Congress in Republican hands?’’ It is so 

farfetched, I am almost embarrassed to be an attorney listening to 

it. 

And you go so far as to buttress your unsupported assertions by 

quoting a local opinion columnist who then speculates that ‘‘U.S. 

Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan might well consider Dr. Wecht a 

plum target, good for many brownie points at the White House.’’ I 

think it is fair to say that is a pretty tenuous argument for questioning the honor and integrity of a United States attorney. 

So let me get back to some of the real evidence issues here and 

ask you do you, sir, have any personal knowledge of any conversations between U.S. Attorney Buchanan and the President in which 

it was discussed that Dr. Wecht should be prosecuted because he 

is a Democrat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I would be mortally embarrassed if I had come 

before this Committee and made a charge that the President of the 

United States had had conversations with U.S. Attorney Buchanan. 

Mr. KELLER. I will take that as a no. 

Mr. THORNBURGH [continuing]. For such statements, and you 

should be cited for misciting the record. 

Mr. KELLER. Well, it is right there. I am quoting your statement. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I did not ever say that the President of the 

United States had any discussions with Ms. Buchanan. 

Mr. KELLER. Do you have any personal knowledge of any conversation between any White House officials and the U.S. Attorney 

Buchanan in which it was discussed that Dr. Wecht should be prosecuted for being Democrat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Ms. Buchanan’s testimony to this Committee 

was given in secret, and I have no access to that, so I cannot answer that. 

Mr. KELLER. You have no such personal knowledge, do you? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Not at this point. 

Mr. KELLER. Do you have any personal knowledge of any conversation between any Department of Justice official and U.S. Attorney Buchanan in which it was discussed that Dr. Wecht should 

be prosecuted because he is a Democrat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. No, I might remind the Member that the Department of Justice has refused to make any of this information 

available to this Committee. 

Mr. KELLER. You do not have any personal knowledge——

Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Chairman, point of order. 

Mr. KELLER. I would like my question answered. 

Mr. DAVIS. Point of order, Mr. Chairman. May the former Attorney General of the United States be allowed to finish his answer? 

Mr. KELLER. I can reclaim my time anytime I like. 

Mr. SCOTT. The Committee will come to order. 

Mr. KELLER. Yes. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman will proceed. We would appreciate it 

if you would, if you are going to ask a question, give him an opportunity to respond. 

Mr. KELLER. I would like an answer. Do you have any personal 

knowledge of any conversation between U.S. Attorney Buchanan 

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and any Department of Justice official whence it was discussed 

that Dr. Wecht should be prosecuted because he is a Democrat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Obviously not. 

Mr. KELLER. Do you have any personal knowledge of any conversation between U.S. Attorney Buchanan and anyone on this 

planet in which it was discussed that Dr. Wecht should be prosecuted because he is a Democrat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Obviously not, since I have no access to the 

public record created by her testimony. 

Mr. KELLER. Have you seen any letter or other document between the U.S. attorney and any person on this planet in which it 

was discussed by U.S. Attorney Buchanan that she was pursuing 

Dr. Wecht because of his political affiliation as a Democrat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. What we have done is respond to this Committee’s request in your investigation of allegations of political influence with a set of facts that raise real questions about why this 

prosecution was initiated in the first place. We do not have access, 

as you do or as other authorities might have, to the record that 

would seek to verify those facts, but we have raised these questions, and we think that is a legitimate role for the Congress to 

play in its oversight function. 

Mr. KELLER. Mr. Attorney General, you have not seen any letter 

or other document? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. No, of course not. 

Mr. KELLER. Okay. You have made the factual assertion that the 

Department of Justice demonstrated that if you play by its rules, 

you will advance. Can you give me the U.S. attorney whose career 

has advanced solely because he or she prosecuted Democrats? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Those were disclosures made in the course of 

the investigation being carried on into political influence within the 

department. 

Mr. KELLER. Do you have the name of any U.S. attorney who——

Mr. THORNBURGH. Have I spoken with him personally? 

Mr. KELLER. The name? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I relied on news accounts and other authorities that——

Mr. KELLER. Tell me the name of the U.S. attorney who was promoted, advanced, according to what you said, because he or she 

prosecuted a Democrat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I cannot give you that information specifically 

now. 

Mr. KELLER. Mr. Chairman, my time has expired. 

Mr. CANNON. Mr. Chairman, may I inquire about just a matter 

of order in the Committee? We have had a couple of times when 

Republicans have been questioning witnesses, not just in this Committee, since we actually have not met as a joint Committee before, 

but in the full Committee. I think Mr. Davis made a point on a couple of occasions that the Member should let a witness answer. 

There is no rule, I believe, that requires that a witness should 

answer. We have the right to inquire, I believe, and if we are a little coarse with a witness, I think that is appropriate, because 

sometimes we have witnesses that are a little bit not forthcoming, 

so I think it would be——

Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Chairman, if I might respond? 

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Mr. CANNON. Well, pardon me. I——

Mr. SCOTT. The Committee will——

Mr. DAVIS. My name was invoked. 

Mr. CANNON. May I just finish by saying that if the Chair would 

please make it clear that it is the gentleman’s time or the 

gentlelady’s time who is making the inquiry, I would appreciate 

that. 

Mr. SCOTT. The Committee will come to order. 

And we would appreciate, just as a matter of courtesy, that if you 

ask the witness a question that the witness be allowed to answer. 

Depending on who the witnesses are, it goes both ways, but we will 

try to be courteous to the witnesses the best we can. 

Mr. KELLER. Mr. Chairman, if I can just interject, if I am asking 

a witness a question, I am not required to sit here and listen to 

5 minutes of nonresponsive sentences under any scenario——

Mr. SCOTT. Well, the gentleman was given——

Mr. KELLER [continuing]. And I will not. 

Mr. SCOTT. All of the——

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Chairman, can I ask for some courtesy for the 

former Attorney General of the United States? 

Mr. SCOTT. The Committee will come to order. 

The opinions have been expressed, and we will move on to the 

next person who is the gentleman from Michigan, Chairman of the 

full Committee. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you. I thank you for keeping us in order 

and lowering the emotional level that was beginning to rise here. 

You are a great Chairman. 

Now I want to help the gentleman from Florida out. I have the 

name of a case he may want to inquire when he was asking of General Thornburgh. If you will examine the case involving U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic, who was on the list to be fired and, after he 

indicted Georgia Thompson, his name was restored. His name was 

taken off the list. So he did not get a promotion, but he did keep 

his job. 

And so what I would like to do now is to ask Attorney General 

Thornburgh if he wanted to make any further elaboration, as eager 

as I am to move on, to the questions that were put to him by my 

friend from Florida? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. No, Mr. Chairman. I think the distinction that 

I am trying to make is that we are engaged by our client to protect 

his rights and will vigorously defend him in the criminal trial set 

for January. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. There is a separate role, however, as the Committee clearly recognizes in the calling of this hearing, the oversight role that this Committee has over the conduct of the Department of Justice and an examination whether allegations of political 

influence have been present in these cases, and it is for that reason 

that we appear today and set forth the testimony that we did. 

Excuse me for interrupting you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CONYERS. No, that is quite all right. 

As a matter of fact, the hearing is cautiously entitled Allegations 

of Selective Prosecution. I commend the two Chairs for their discretion in titling the hearing. 

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But we started off earlier in the year with the politicization of 

the Department of Justice. These hearings follow along to allegations of prosecutorial abuse. That is a very direct connected line. 

This is not some off-the-wall hearing. This directly follows the work 

of both these Subcommittees that we have gone along. 

Now somehow this former U.S. attorney from Alabama has persuaded me to give him a minute of my time, so when I get to 4 

minutes, would somebody please advise me so I can recognize him? 

The yellow light will come on. 

Okay. Thanks, Mel Watt. I will remember this. 

Before the yellow light comes on, I want to put in here everything I have said has been beyond controversy, and I just want to 

start off with the statement of the prosecutor from Louisiana to 

show you how far prosecutors have gotten out of line. 

He infamously stated to a room full of schoolchildren, ‘‘I can ruin 

your life with the stroke of a pen.’’ Can you imagine a state prosecutor talking to a group of schoolchildren like that? 

And then I have for the record, just for those of you who may 

not remember it, when Attorney General Gonzales spoke before 

U.S. attorneys, he said, ‘‘I work for the White House, and you work 

for the White House,’’ and as a matter of fact, it cost one U.S. attorney his job, if our investigation was correct. 

And then there is Monica—oh, the light went on. Okay, there is 

Monica Goodling who was nervously called into the White House 

by then Attorney General Gonzales, and she was interviewed about 

her steadfastness in her position as liaison to the White House, and 

she admitted sitting right in the chair that Donald Fields is in 

that, ‘‘Yes, I did cross the line a number of times in my job.’’

And I yield now to my friend from Alabama, Artur Davis. 

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to make one quick point before too much time goes forward in the hearing. 

And I thank the Chair for yielding. 

The very able Ranking Member is a good friend of mine, Mr. 

Forbes. I was surprised by an assertion that he made during his 

opening statement regarding Jill Simpson, one of the witnesses in 

the Siegelman case. My friend, Mr. Forbes, at one point suggested 

that Ms. Simpson’s testimony had been conclusively debunked, as 

he put it, and he amazed me by somehow suggesting that the Committee should refer her for prosecution. 

One point that I hope my friend from Virginia will take note of—

and I would ask unanimous consent to introduce Exhibit 4 to the 

Simpson deposition into the record. Exhibit 4 to the Simpson deposition is a list of wireless phone calls made from her phone—if you 

examine the phone list, on November 18, 2002, the date that she 

contends that she made a phone call to Rob Riley and others, there 

is a number listed, 205–870–9866, 11/18, duration for 11 minutes. 

All three affidavits submitted from Mr. Butts, Mr. Lembke and 

Mr. Riley deny that there was a conference call that occurred on 

November 18. 

I ask to also introduce into the record a search for law firms in 

Alabama on NetOpus.net. Enter the law firm name Riley Jackson. 

The following phone number comes up, 205–870–9866——

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman’s time——

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Mr. DAVIS [continuing]. The exact same phone number that surfaces in Exhibit 4. 

Mr. Forbes, in light of that revelation that these three affidavits 

are contradicted by the phone record, I ask you to withdraw your 

statement, sir, regarding possible perjury by Ms. Simpson. 

Mr. SCOTT. Is the gentleman asking unanimous consent to put 

these into the record? 

Mr. DAVIS. Yes. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection. 

[The information referred to follows:]


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The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Do you want——

Mr. FORBES. Yes, Mr. Chairman. If the gentleman would listen 

to my statement, I did not say perjury. I said referred to the Department of Justice for investigation. 

Mr. DAVIS. I thought it was extraordinary, Mr. Forbes, sir, your 

statement is contradicted by the phone records. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman’s time has expired. If the Ranking 

Member wants to finish his response or make a response to the 

gentleman’s comments——

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Chairman, I was very careful in saying that it 

should be referred to the Department of Justice. 

And the other thing that I emphasized—the gentleman probably 

heard—was Ms. Simpson’s not here. It would be very easy to bring 

Ms. Simpson here—you had the ability to call the witnesses—and 

have Ms. Simpson choose the kingpin, have her be in testimony, to 

have her be here so that we could cross-examine. She is not here. 

That is my statement, I believe it is accurate, and——

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. The Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, Mr. Cannon? 

Mr. CANNON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I appreciate the 

calm and thoughtful way you have been handling this hearing. 

A couple of points that I would like to make before I ask some 

questions. In response to Mr. Conyers, I just would like to point out 

to Mr. Biskupic or Biskupic never knew that his name was on the 

list, and I think we have verified that through out discussions with 

various witnesses. 

And, secondly, I would like to congratulate the gentleman from 

Michigan and do hope that the newspapers lead with the headline 

‘‘allegations’’ in huge type, and then the rest of this about selective 

prosecution in small letters, because that is clearly the distinction 

that we are dealing with here. 

And I want to apologize, Mr. Chairman, also. We have a markup 

in Resources, and I have to be over there to vote. I have been here 

other than the voting over there, but I did need to be gone. I am 

sorry. 

I apologize to our witnesses for not having been here for the 

questioning, and I apologize if I am redundant in any way. 

But, Mr. Thornburgh, I would actually like to ask you a question, 

a bit of a loaded question, I grant you, but do you believe that your 

client is innocent? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I believe that the government has the responsibility to prove his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and my role 

is to hold the government to that standard. My beliefs one way or 

the other are not really relevant. 

Obviously, I believe that this is an unjustified prosecution based 

on the facts that I set forth and which involved to me the use of 

trivial irregularities and an attempt to escalate those into Federal 

felony charges. In that sense, I do believe he is innocent. 

Mr. CANNON. Well, that was really quite direct. Thank you. 

I note that we have television cameras here today, and it occurs 

to the mind it is not because of large type allegations but because 

316

of your presence as a former Republican Attorney General. Now I 

recognize the fact that you have a special interest in the Department of Justice and that your concerns about the department carry 

a personalized and a particular view. 

But it seems to me that your appearance here today does a couple of dramatic things. In the first place, it says that you believe 

strongly enough about this that you should appear. Don’t you think 

that affects the nature of the case that is going forward in a way 

that may help your client, but may be detrimental to the department? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I would certainly hope not. I appear here 

today as a lawyer for an individual who has been charged with a 

Federal felony, serious, 84 counts of felony, and my job as a lawyer 

is to represent that individual as best I can and see that insofar 

as he is concerned, justice is accomplished. 

Mr. CANNON. That is a very lawyerly statement, and I agree with 

it entirely as a lawyer. But you are not just a lawyer. The reason 

the cameras are here today are not because you are a lawyer defending a client who you may believe or whom you are just defending and trying to get the best defense possible. That is not why 

they are here. They are here because of your prior status. Doesn’t 

that concern you somewhat? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Well, I do have a devotion to the Department 

of Justice. I served over half of my professional career in the Department of Justice in one capacity or another, and I have spoken 

out previously on irregularities that I think are occurring, most notably on the attempt to subvert the attorney-client privilege which 

has been undertaken by the department. 

Mr. CANNON. And we agree on that point, by the way. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Well, that is an example——

Mr. CANNON. There are lots of issues out here. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Yeah, that is right, and one of the issues to 

me is the overreaching of Federal prosecutors to create Federal offenses out of trivial violations of——

Mr. CANNON. We do not disagree on much, let me just say, and, 

clearly, look, my biggest concern is with your role and your history 

and your current advocacy because you are advocating for your client. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I am, indeed. I am here——

Mr. CANNON. My problem is that the Justice Department will always have problems whatever the Administration is, and it is the 

job of this Committee to help keep those things on track. It is easy 

for that organization to go off track a little bit. It has, as you know, 

wonderful institutions, wonderful rules, wonderful checks and balances within the department. Those are deteriorating for many reasons, including the war on terror. 

I would just in conclusion suggest that you take a step back as 

an advocate and recognize that our job here is not to hammer the 

former Attorney General, not to make a case in a narrow sense 

against one prosecutor or against, say, two prosecutors, which, by 

the way, after having been in some of these cases, they are not before us today. 

The fact is we have prosecutors who, generally speaking, are 

doing a good job and, as a Committee, we have a responsibility to 

317

help reinforce the good and root out the bad, and I suspect that if 

you reflect on this, you are going to agree that your advocacy here 

probably is counterproductive to your longer-term views and concerns about the department. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I would certainly hope not, but I appreciate 

your views on that. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Did the gentleman from Georgia have a motion to make? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, Mr. Chairman. I request that the gentleman 

from Alabama, Mr. Davis, be granted 1 minute of my time. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, the gentleman from Alabama is 

recognized for 6 minutes. 

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Mr. Johnson, for yielding. 

Mr. Jones, most of my questions would be to you, but I do 

want——

Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Chairman? 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman from Massachusetts? 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Yes. A parliamentary inquiry. 

Mr. SCOTT. State the inquiry. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Is it appropriate at this point in time for me to 

move to grant to the gentleman from Alabama 4 minutes of my 

time? 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, the gentleman is recognized for 10 

minutes. 

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Delahunt, for being so gracious, also. 

Most of my questions, Mr. Jones, would be to you, but I want to 

briefly pick up on the point that I made before. There was a loss 

of exchange between myself and Mr. Forbes. 

One of the irresolvable questions before this Committee is the veracity of the individuals who submitted these affidavits. This Committee is not a grand jury. This Committee is not a jury. So we are 

enormously limited and we should be limited in our capacity to determine who is being accurate and who is not. I suppose the public 

has to make that judgment. 

But I do want to make sure that we do not turn this into a hearing in which we cast dispersions on witnesses to suggest that they 

have manipulated their testimony and, if that is done, it needs to 

be done with a factual foundation. So I turn again to the point that 

I made earlier. 

This is a material question here. Simpson alleges that on November 18, 2002, she had a conference call with Terry Butts, former 

member of the Alabama Supreme Court who had become politically 

active; a gentleman named William Canary, political operative in 

Alabama whose wife was the U.S. attorney then and is still now 

the U.S. attorney of the Middle District of Alabama; and Rob Riley, 

an attorney who practices at the firm Riley Jackson, the son of the 

current governor. 

Three affidavits submitted today by Mr. Riley, Mr. Butts, and 

another individual who was working for Mr. Butts, Mr. Matt 

Lembke. All three of these affidavits make the assertion that there 

was no phone call on November 18 in which they participated with 

Jill Simpson. Exhibit 4 to the Simpson deposition, which I have 

asked unanimous consent that it be introduced into the record of 

318

these proceedings, is crystal clear on one point. If you look at the 

bottom of the entry, 11/18/2002, a call to Birmingham, Alabama, to 

205–870–9866, for 11 minutes. If you run a search on NetOpus.net, 

you will find Riley & Jackson, phone number 205–870–9866. 

Mr. Chairman, I believe I have asked unanimous consent that 

this search inquiry be admitted into the record. 

So, before we make judgments about Simpson or anyone else, let 

those judgments not be immediately contradicted by the phone 

records and the unimpeachable facts. 

Mr. Jones, you mentioned your representation as Don 

Siegelman’s attorney in connection with the matters that eventually led to his indictment. I want to focus you on one timeframe. 

I want to focus you on the end of 2004, at least the last 6 months 

of 2004. 

Because even with 10 minutes, my time is limited. I am going 

to move to the questions, and I ask you to give me quick responses. 

In the end of 2005 or that last 6 months of 2004, were you in 

regular conversations with two prosecutors in Montgomery and the 

U.S. attorney’s office, Mr. Feaga and Mr. Franklin? 

Mr. JONES. Congressman, I attempted to be for several months 

after we were told we would get an answer within 30 days. I attempted to be, and it was very little conversation until ultimately 

the conversation on the telephone in late November, early December of 2004

Mr. DAVIS. Okay. Now, before we get to that, during the period 

of time when you were in communication with Mr. Feaga and Mr. 

Franklin, did there come a point when they made representations 

to you regarding the quality of their case against Mr. Siegelman? 

Mr. JONES. Yes. That was in July of 2004. 

Mr. DAVIS. Would you quickly tell the Committee about that conversation? 

Mr. JONES. Essentially, we were told that most all of the allegations that we had been looking at previously had been written off, 

they were too trivial to bring with the former governor. 

Mr. DAVIS. Now let me slow you down. This is important. The 

people who made the representation to you that most of the allegations against Don Siegelman had been written off were the two 

prosecutors, Mr. Feaga and Mr. Franklin. Is that right? 

Mr. JONES. That is correct. 

Mr. DAVIS. All right. Continue. 

Mr. JONES. We were also told that they had narrowed the focus 

down—they had only been on the case, by the way, about 3 

months—into three areas. Two of those areas which I have outlined 

were absolutely clear. There was no crime committed. We knew 

that there was nothing there. They recognized that. The issue with 

the——

Mr. DAVIS. And, again, I am going to slow you down. When you 

say ‘‘they recognized that,’’ you are saying that Mr. Franklin and 

Mr. Feaga acknowledged to you that two other areas had little or 

no merit? 

Mr. JONES. Well, I will not say they used those terms, but it was 

pretty obvious they were concerned about that area. 

Mr. DAVIS. Okay. 

319

Mr. JONES. The third one involved the allegation of this appointment of Richard Scrushy to the CON Board, and while Mr. Feaga 

did say——

Mr. DAVIS. Now let me slow you down because, again, you and 

I know these facts. Everybody here does not. There was an allegation that was eventually included in the indictment that Mr. 

Scrushy was appointed to the state certificate of need board and 

that there was a quid pro quo in which Scrushy agreed to contribute money to a lottery initiative the governor was sponsoring. 

That was one of the allegations, correct? 

Mr. JONES. Correct. 

Mr. DAVIS. And Mr. Feaga and Mr. Franklin indicated to you, did 

they not, that that was the dominant area in which they were looking as of July 2004? Is that correct? 

Mr. JONES. That is correct, Congressman. 

Mr. DAVIS. Did Mr. Feaga and Mr. Franklin characterize to you 

the quality of the evidence around that particular allegation? 

Mr. JONES. The way they characterized the evidence, you know, 

Mr. Feaga in particular felt that the circumstantial evidence, in his 

view, was compelling, but as I rattled off all the defenses and all 

of the facts that were holes that they had in the case, which they 

never filled, by the way, he also acknowledged that the defenses in 

that case factually and legally were also compelling, and it was 

very troubling, and it indicated to us that if he could not fill those 

holes, then likely these charges would not be brought. 

Mr. DAVIS. Did the lottery transaction or the alleged quid pro 

quo rest on the testimony of one particular cooperating defendant, 

Nick Bailey? 

Mr. JONES. Nick Bailey solely. 

Mr. DAVIS. Did Mr. Feaga indicate to you in his conversations 

that there were problems with the credibility of Nick Bailey? 

Mr. JONES. Yes. Everyone——

Mr. DAVIS. Would you tell the Committee about that? 

Mr. JONES. He knew that. Everyone knew that. Mr. Bailey had 

committed several crimes with Lanny Young. He had taken a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of bribes, and there was a serious gap factually in——

Mr. DAVIS. In addition to the normal kinds of impeachment, cooperating witness, the fact that Mr. Bailey admitted to numerous 

crimes, did Mr. Bailey or did Mr. Feaga indicate to you that at one 

point Mr. Bailey had changed his story regarding the transaction? 

Mr. JONES. Not at that time. Not at that time, Congressman. At 

that time, that was the significant gap because what Mr. Bailey 

was telling them could not match up to the objective facts about 

when the check was cut, when it was delivered to Montgomery. 

Mr. DAVIS. And did Mr. Feaga acknowledge that there was this 

gap based on Mr. Bailey’s testimony? 

Mr. JONES. Oh, yes, sir. Absolutely. And it was not until later 

when I brought that back up—and this would have been in 2005—

where he said, ‘‘Well, Mr. Bailey has now essentially rethought his 

testimony, and that is not’’——

Mr. DAVIS. All right. But as of July of 2004, did Mr. Feaga suggest to you that there were major factual gaps in Nick Bailey’s testimony? 

320

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir. That is why he wanted us to toll the statute 

of limitations so they could try to fill those gaps. 

Mr. DAVIS. All right. What was your state of mind in July, early 

summer of 2004, regarding the likelihood of the U.S. attorney’s office bringing a case against Don Siegelman? 

Mr. JONES. All three of us—all three of the defense lawyers—felt 

like that case was coming to a close within the next——

Mr. DAVIS. And was that based on statements or your reading 

from statements that the prosecutors—Mr. Franklin, Mr. Feaga—

made to you? 

Mr. JONES. It was based on those statements. It was based on 

my 20-something years of experience, and it was based on our own 

investigation. 

Mr. DAVIS. Did there come a point at the end of 2004 when Mr. 

Feaga indicated to you that he had been in communications with 

the Department of Justice regarding this case? 

Mr. JONES. That is correct. In late November of 2004, early December, Mr. Feaga apologized for not giving us the answer he had 

promised earlier, but indicated there had been a meeting in Washington and that the lawyers in Washington had asked him to go 

back and look at the case, review the case top to bottom. 

Mr. DAVIS. Did Mr. Feaga suggest to you when the communications with the lawyers in Washington had happened regarding the 

Siegelman case? 

Mr. JONES. He did not. He just said, ‘‘We had a meeting in Washington.’’

Mr. DAVIS. But your interaction with Mr. Feaga was in November 2004. Is that correct? 

Mr. JONES. Correct. 

Mr. DAVIS. Inferring to you that the conversations happened at 

some point prior to November 2004? 

Mr. JONES. That is correct. 

Mr. DAVIS. We have had the Ranking Member introduce into the 

record the full transcript, the sworn transcript, of Jill Simpson’s 

testimony of September 14. Let me refer to it. 

On pages 50, 51 and 52, Ms. Simpson testifies that in early 2005, 

she had an exchange with an individual, Rob Riley, and that Mr. 

Riley made the representation to her that he had been told that 

Karl Rove, the President’s former political adviser, had been in 

communication with the Office of Public Integrity and that he, Mr. 

Rove, had prodded the Office of Public Integrity to bring a case 

against Mr. Siegelman. 

Certainly, all of us figured on time to review in detail what she 

said, but that is contained on pages 50, 51 and 52. In other words, 

Ms. Simpson’s suggests that the timeframe of Rove’s intervention 

happened in late 2004, Mr. Rove’s intervention at the Department 

of Justice. 

Mr. Jones, did Mr. Feaga indicated to you that he had been in 

communication with the Department of Justice at some point in 

late 2004 during the exact timeframe as Simpson alludes to? 

Mr. JONES. Congressman, he not only indicated to me, but there 

were lawyers representing witnesses later on that he also made the 

same representations to. Yes. 

321

Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Chairman, my time has expired. I will have my 

5 minutes come around to me eventually, but I thank my colleagues for yielding their time to me. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. I think we used your 5 minutes. You had 

4 from Delahunt, 1 from the gentleman from Georgia and your 5. 

So I think you may be getting someone else’s. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Chairman, I would be happy to yield a minute 

of my time to the gentleman. 

Mr. SCOTT. Okay. Let’s go at this time to the gentleman from 

Ohio, Mr. Jordan? 

Mr. JORDAN. I thank the Chairman. I would like to yield a couple 

minutes to the Ranking Member on the Commercial Committee. 

Mr. CANNON. Thank you. I appreciate the yielding. 

And I am intrigued by the gentleman from Alabama, Mr. Davis, 

who, as I understand, was a prosecutor and who is now interrogating a friendly witness based upon conversations with the opposition, and I think the record should sort of reflect the fact that the 

testimony thus far is sort of one-sided. 

I would like to suggest a couple of things here. In the first case, 

Mr. Feaga is a well-known prosecutor who, in fact, did prosecute 

Democratic Governor Siegelman, but he also prosecuted former Republican Governor Guy Hunt. This is a guy who I think is well-respected in the field. You may have some personal views about him. 

I do not know, Mr. Davis. But he is not a Republican hack going 

after Democrats. I do not think that would be fair to say. 

And I would like to ask unanimous consent to introduce into the 

record a letter to The New York Times sent by Mr. Feaga, and I 

am just going to read one paragraph, and then I will yield back. 

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. DAVIS. If the gentleman would yield, he is actually a very 

fine lawyer, and I work with him. He inquired about my personal 

opinion, a very fine man, a very fine lawyer. I did not suggest otherwise. 

Mr. CANNON. I appreciate that, especially in the context of his 

statement. This is a letter to the editor of The New York Times, 

I believe. ‘‘The case of the United States v. Siegelman was pursued 

and successfully prosecuted because my co-counsel and I, a grand 

jury, a trial jury and a Federal judge, after hearing the facts, believed that those facts established that Siegelman unlawfully sold 

out the best interests of the people in the State of Alabama. Any 

assertion to the contrary, regardless how well or maliciously intended, is just plain wrong. We are not a court of law. We are not 

a jury. We are not looking at Mr. Feaga.’’

And I think that he has actually come out of this particular 

round of this discussion pretty darn well, and the friendly witness 

testimony to the contrary notwithstanding, this is not about whether Mr. Siegelman should or should not be in jail. It is about the 

Department of Justice, and I think that what we have heard so far 

is not compelling that we have a problem with it or the problems 

we have are not being resolved by this hearing. 

And I would yield back to the gentleman from Ohio, and I think 

that the gentleman, Mr. Forbes, would like to have time yielded to 

him. 

Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Chairman, I would like yield the remainder of 

my time to Mr. Forbes. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Jones, I just want to come back to you because, you know, 

the problem we have with these hearings is we get all kinds of apples and oranges and everything that is involved, and I know that 

you did not get to be in the trial with Governor Siegelman. That 

was your testimony. 

Mr. JONES. Correct. That is correct. 

Mr. FORBES. But Governor Siegelman did go to trial. Isn’t that 

true? 

Mr. JONES. He did. 

Mr. FORBES. And he had, I am sure, talented and competent attorneys who you would worked with before, and you do not lay any 

claim that they were not competent or did not do a good job at the 

trial, did you? 

Mr. JONES. You know they are sitting right behind me, and I 

would not dare say that. [Laughter.] 

Mr. FORBES. They would beat you. They would hit you with a 

chair by then. 

Mr. JONES. No. You are right. 

Mr. FORBES. And all they were able to ask whatever questions 

they want under the appropriate rules of procedure for the court 

to the witnesses that were testifying at that trial, weren’t they? 

Mr. JONES. I am assuming that is true. 

Mr. FORBES. And at the end of all of that trial, not the short little tidbits that we have here today, but at the end of the trial, a 

full Federal trial, a jury found Governor Siegelman guilty. Is that 

correct? 

Mr. JONES. That is correct. 

325

Mr. FORBES. And I am sure there were motions made after that 

to the Federal judge to find something that the jury did wrong, and 

the judge said no and he sentenced Governor Siegelman based on 

that trial. Is that accurate? 

Mr. JONES. That is correct. 

Mr. FORBES. And now that is up on appeal, and we trust judges 

to look at that. In fact, the Chairman of this Committee made a 

statement the other day when he came in to national security 

issues. If you trust judges, you do not have any problem with this 

act. We trust them for national security issues, but we do not trust 

them on these kind of legal procedures. 

And, basically, Mr. Thornburgh raised the question about the appearance of impropriety, and then we emphasize allegations. But 

here is what happens. The cycle repeats itself over and over again. 

You make allegations. You bring witnesses in who make statements sometimes without facts because it is something they have 

read in the paper or they have heard or they have seen. The prosecutors cannot even come in here and refute it because they feel 

ethically that would be improper to do. 

Then you make the allegations long enough and loud enough, 

people begin believing and taking those allegations as fact, and 

then, all of a sudden, you have an appearance of impropriety which 

leads to the erosion of public confidence. We come in here and repeat the cycle over and say, ‘‘Why does it happen?’’

Mr. Shields, I hope I will get a few more minutes with you, but 

I only have a couple seconds now. 

You do not have a law degree, do you? 

Mr. SHIELDS. No. 

Mr. JONES. And you do not have a degree in statistics, do you? 

Mr. SHIELDS. I have taken a number of statistics courses. 

Mr. SCOTT. Will the gentleman use the microphone, please? 

Mr. JONES. But you have taken some courses, right? 

Mr. SHIELDS. I have taken about 18 hours worth, yes. 

Mr. JONES. Okay. And in just the couple of seconds I have left, 

why did you not limit the data in your study to either actual indictments or convictions instead of just the ones that were reported in 

newspapers? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, because I am a communication professor, and 

I am interested in communications. 

Mr. JONES. That is right. You are a communication professor, 

and you are not looking at statistics of what actually happened. 

You are looking at the communications. But isn’t it true—or maybe 

you do not know this, not having a law degree or a statistics degree—but a lot of investigations by prosecutors are never made 

public, are they? 

Mr. SHIELDS. No, but they are just as damaging when they are 

made public, as if they had prosecuted. 

Mr. JONES. I am sorry? 

Mr. SHIELDS. As if they had indicted——

Mr. JONES. No, no. When you are looking at the investigations, 

there are a lot of investigations that take place that are not reported in newspapers. Isn’t that true? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, I have found——

Mr. JONES. But you do not know that. You are not a lawyer. 

326

Mr. SHIELDS. I am not a lawyer, but I have found a number of 

investigations were reported in the newspaper. 

Mr. JONES. I see, but you do not know about the ones that were 

not reported in the newspapers. 

Mr. SHIELDS. No. 

Mr. JONES. Okay. Thank you. 

Mr. SHIELDS. The DOJ will not give us that information. 

Mr. JONES. That is right. 

I yield back. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Watt? 

Mr. WATT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Professor Shields, I am struck by one particular section of your 

testimony that I want to read into the record and get you to elaborate on. 

Your hypothesis was that party affiliations of the officials and 

candidates investigated would match the normative data. I am 

reading from page 4 of your testimony. However, the sample includes 631, 76.95 percent, investigations of Democrats and 142, 

17.32 percent, investigations of Republicans, and 47, 5.73 percent, 

investigations of Independents or other officeholders or candidates. 

And then you say this, which I want to make sure that nobody 

misses, ‘‘The disparity in the proportions of the actual sample between investigations and-or indictments of Democrats in relation to 

Republicans is again statistically significant beyond the .0001 level 

and could have occurred by chance less than one in 1,000 samples. 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes, that is 10,000. 

Mr. WATT. One in 10,000 samples. Does that mean, Professor, 

that all else, everything else being equal, the chances of no political 

partisanship being taken into consideration in this grouping of 

prosecutions, charges, investigations, is less than one in 10,000? 

Mr. SHIELDS. It is pretty significant data, yes. That is the point. 

Less than one in 10,000 chances of this data being in error when 

you do the chi-square statistic. 

Mr. WATT. Okay. And so if you just did a regular statistical analysis, the chances that something other than sheer chance was 

taken into account? 

Mr. SHIELDS. That is correct. That is correct. 

Mr. WATT. It is less than one in 10,000. 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. 

Mr. WATT. Okay. That is what I wanted to be clear on. 

With that, I will yield the balance of my time to the gentleman 

from Alabama. 

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Watt. 

Mr. Jones, let me return to you, and let us pick up the timeframe 

that we previously talked about after Mr. Feaga represented to you 

that the Department of Justice wanted a review of this case. As 

you move into the 2005 calendar year, did there seem to be a 

change in the tenor and the tone of the investigation that you 

noted? 

Mr. JONES. A hundred and eighty degrees opposite. 

Mr. DAVIS. Would you tell us about it? 

Mr. JONES. Every month with the grand jury, we saw new witnesses coming forward. Everything was back off the table. The Federal role was, I think, greater. It was very public, and it was very 

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intense. It was not a review literally as a review. It was as if the 

case started all over again. 

Mr. DAVIS. Did it appear that the U.S. attorney’s office had ceded 

a significant amount of the day-in, day-out responsibility in this 

case to the Department of Justice? 

Mr. JONES. Well, the FBI were doing the day to day, and Mr. 

Feaga was conducting most of that grand jury, as I understand it. 

Mr. DAVIS. Does the name Noel Hillman register to you? 

Mr. JONES. Yes. He was head of the public integrity section at 

the time. 

Mr. DAVIS. Did Mr. Hillman at some point move from public integrity to become a United States district judge? 

Mr. JONES. He did. 

Mr. DAVIS. And was it shortly after the period of time in which 

he would have been the Office of Public Integrity to go from Public 

Integrity to the U.S. district judgeship? 

Mr. JONES. That is correct. That is correct. 

Mr. DAVIS. Let me refer to the opening statement that you have 

submitted to the Committee today. I want you to elaborate on this 

sentence. You talk about how the tenor and tone of the investigation changed, and there appeared to be a systematic effort to gather any negative evidence on Mr. Siegelman. 

This is what you say, ‘‘Targeting individuals rather than crimes 

taints that entire process,’’ referring to the system of justice, ‘‘and 

gives investigators and prosecutors an ends-justify-the-means license to abuse the public’s trust.’’

Mr. Jones, would you elaborate on what you mean by that sentence? 

Mr. JONES. Certainly, that is exactly what appeared to have happened here. There were allegations that had surfaced that had 

been written off, but then, all of a sudden, there was this much 

wider net that we were seeing that included every financial contributor, every investment that Don Siegelman had made, every 

check that his wife had written. This was—my public statements 

reflect it—an investigation about an individual, and that is just 

something that we cannot tolerate in this country, to investigate 

individuals. It does give prosecutors—and investigators as well—licenses to change, to twist, to cajole testimony. 

Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Thornburgh, would you comment on that? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. I think that the responsibility of prosecutors 

at every level of government is simply to follow the evidence wherever it leads, and oftentimes it leads to people in high public office, 

and they should not hesitate to prosecute those persons. But it is 

all evidence based and not based on any targeting process. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from Ohio, do you have a motion? 

Ms. SUTTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I ask unanimous consent to yield my 5 minutes to the gentleman, 

Mr. Davis. 

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Chairman, I have no problem with her yielding 

her 5 minutes when it is time for her to go, if that is okay. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, her time is yielded to the gentleman from Alabama and will be used when her time would have 

come up. 

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Ms. SUTTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Gohmert? 

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I appreciate the witnesses being here. 

As a former judge, former prosecutor, former chief justice, I am 

always curious as to how people arrive at conclusions, and so I am 

curious about a number of things. 

First of all, I really do not know the answer. Do you know how 

many Democratic Party members are elected officeholders in the 

United States? Any one of you? 

Mr. SHIELDS. The total number of elected officials in the United 

States is estimated at slightly over 500,000, and so it would be 

about 50 percent of that. 

Mr. GOHMERT. And where does that information come from? 

Mr. SHIELDS. The total number of elected officers, I think, comes 

from the Department of Commerce, and the 50 percent information 

comes from the Eagleton Institute of Rutgers University. 

Mr. GOHMERT. The Eagleton Institute? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Okay. And do you know how recent that 50 percent figure was obtained and how it was obtained? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. I obtained it when I started the study, and it 

is as recent as 2002. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Okay. All right. So it does not take into account, 

well, I guess the last 5 years then. And that is interesting that it 

is 50-50, and it is——

Mr. SHIELDS. No, it is 50, 41 and 9. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Oh, 50——

Mr. SHIELDS. Forty-one Republican and 9 Independent-Other. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Oh, okay. So there are many more Democratic 

Party member officeholders than there are Republicans. 

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, there is 9 percent more. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Okay. All right. Okay. And by your study, have 

you ruled out the possibility completely that perhaps there are 

more Democratic Party member officeholders who have violated the 

law than there are Republicans who have violated it? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Well——

Mr. GOHMERT. Do you just take that as a given or——

Mr. SHIELDS. No, Mr. Gohmert. That is a legitimate question, 

and that is why I had the control group with nonfederal law enforcement from the state and county, the city prosecutorial level as 

reported in the study. There were 251 individuals in that, and 

there the investigations reflected 50 percent Democrat, 41 percent 

Republican and 9 percent Independent/Other, which, across the 

Nation, meant that it exactly matched the percentages of elected 

officeholders. So——

Mr. GOHMERT. Okay. So——

Mr. SHIELDS [continuing]. That there was no political bias at the 

state and local level, and the question then became: Why is there 

at the Federal level? 

Mr. GOHMERT. Okay. So you would take a city or take 251. How 

did you arrive at those 251? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Selected them from newspaper accounts and television accounts using Google searches. 

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Mr. GOHMERT. Right. But you are saying that was your control 

group. I find it interesting, though, when you try to extrapolate 

numbers across the country because we know from some of our 

Committee hearings, for example, there are six murders per 

100,000 people in New York, there were 50 murders per 100,000 

in New Orleans before Katrina. I think our last hearing said there 

were 90 murders. So there are different rates of crime around the 

county depending on what is being prosecuted and which crimes 

are actually being looked at. 

But I am so intrigued. When I was looking at your study and 

some of the results because this is my third year here in Congress, 

and the whole time here, I have heard now Speaker Pelosi and 

other leaders in the Congress talk about repeatedly Republican culture of corruption, Republican culture of corruption, Republican 

culture of corruption, and I had no idea there were more Democrats 

corrupt than there were Republicans, according to the prosecutions 

that were going on. So that was quite enlightening. 

Mr. SHIELDS. I suspect that is because she was talking about her 

colleagues in the House and the colleagues in the Senate. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Well, that is an interesting issue, too, because if 

you read the 80-page affidavit getting a search warrant to go into 

William Jefferson’s office, and if you took the things in there that 

were sworn to be true as true, then I do not know why he was not 

prosecuted prior to the 2006 election. It looks like it was a laydown case if they could prove the things they swore were true in 

that affidavit. 

Yet the prosecution, as I understand it, demanded that a month 

before the election, he enter the plea if there were going to be any 

agreement. Otherwise, the agreement was off, which sure looks like 

politics, kind of like when Caspar Weinberger was indicted in June 

before the election in 1992 which had an effect on the election, just 

like Bob Ney’s situation did, too. So I see why it was——

Mr. SHIELDS. Mr. Gohmert——

Mr. GOHMERT [continuing]. Enlightening to know that there are 

more Democrats in trouble than there are Republicans, and I am 

pleased to know that I will be able to use your study helpfully——

Mr. SHIELDS. There are 17 percent in the sample. I would say 

that sometimes——

Mr. GOHMERT. Oh, so you are saying that that is——

Mr. SHIELDS. No, it is not. 

Mr. GOHMERT [continuing]. Not a big deal? 

Mr. SHIELDS. The issue you raise of timing of when the investigations occur is very important no matter whether it is a Republican 

or whether it is a Democrat. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Sure it is. 

Mr. SHIELDS. I am not here to defend one or the other. I do not 

like either one of them when they occur, and there is no doubt, I 

think, that this Justice Department also investigated some liberal 

Republicans that did not quite pass their litmus test, and I think 

that is probably reflected in the data, too. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. GOHMERT. I would yield back, but I do not have anything to 

yield. 

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Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Johnson, for 4 minutes? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Perhaps the most significant statement about the dangers of political interference with prosecutorial judgments was made by then 

Attorney General and later Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson who stated that, ‘‘With the law books filled with a great assortment of crimes, a prosecutor stands a fair chance of finding at least 

a technical violation of some act on the part of almost anyone. 

‘‘In such a case, it is not a question of discovering the commission 

of a crime and then looking for the man who has committed it. It 

is a question of picking the man and then searching the law books 

or putting the investigators to work to pin some offense on him. 

‘‘It is in this realm in which the prosecutor picks someone whom 

he dislikes or desires to embarrass or selects some group or unpopular person and then looks for an offense that the greatest danger of abuse of prosecuting power lies.’’

And having said that, I would like to point out that along with 

concerns about Governor Siegelman and George Wilson being investigated because of pressure from the White House and from 

Karl Rove, there are concerns about the prosecution of Georgia 

State Senator Charles Walker. 

Senator Walker has a case that is on appeal. His lawyers, 

Dershowitz, Eiger & Adelson, in an October 22, 2007, letter, which 

appears in our packet, have asked the Committee to take a look at 

this case, and I just want to talk about the case. 

Senator Walker was one of the Georgia’s most prominent Black 

politicians, a former state senator who had served in a legislature 

for 20 years. He made history in 1996 by being elected as senate 

majority leader in Georgia, making him the first African-American 

to become a senate leader in the country. His efforts in changing 

the state flag and beating the current governor for the position of 

senate majority leader has led many to believe that those events 

led to his downfall. 

During the current governor’s campaign for governor—and he 

switched from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party—the 

current governor vowed to create an inspector general’s office to investigate corruption and cronyism. To drive the point home, he not 

only traveled to Senator Walker’s hometown of Augusta to introduce this initiative, he held a press conference in front of one of 

Senator Walker’s businesses. 

Concurrently, the Georgia Republican leadership openly pressed 

the U.S. attorney to go after prominent Democrats, a fact that was 

confirmed through a subsequent investigation by the Justice Department. The current governor won the election. 

Walker was defeated in his bid for re-election, and it was later 

revealed that the U.S. attorney, Richard Thompson, was carrying 

out a political agenda with respect to some of his investigations on 

Walker and others. The Office of Professional Responsibility investigation within the Department of Justice found that Thompson 

was guilty of a number of politically motivated ethical lapses, including his duty to refrain from making public comments on ongoing investigations, his duty to refrain from participating in a matter that directly affected the interest of a personal friend, that is, 

331

the governor, and political ally and, three, his duty to refrain from 

taking action that would interfere with or affect an election. 

The investigation concluded that U.S. Attorney Thompson 

abused his authority and violated the public trust for the purposes 

of benefiting a personal and political ally. Thompson later resigned 

his office as U.S. attorney in disgrace. 

The investigation of the former officials were dropped, but the investigation of Senator Walker continued. Thompson’s successor, 

Lisa Godby Wood, continued the investigation which resulted in an 

indictment filed against Walker on 142 counts of mail fraud, tax 

fraud and conspiracy, including numerous counts related to his 

service as a member of the Georgia Assembly. 

Several questions with respect to Senator Walker’s trial had been 

raised from the integrity of the judge presiding to the selection of 

the jury. The judge, U.S. District Court Judge Dudley Bowen, 

whose nomination Senator Walker had opposed due to allegations 

that the judge was a member of private clubs which excluded 

Blacks, had close ties to the Augusta newspaper which was the 

principal competitor of Senator Walker’s newspaper business, and 

the jury pool was expanded from the largely minority district of 

Augusta, Georgia, to the outlying areas outlining the city which is 

predominantly White which resulted in an expanded jury pool. 

This issue has ignited a lot of attention. Senator Walker’s case 

is on appeal. 

And I will yield back the remainder of my time. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

The gentleman from California, Mr. Lungren, who is a former attorney general? 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

And I thank the witnesses for appearing. 

The quote from Justice Jackson was, in fact, an important quote 

for all of us to consider, particularly the part where he says, ‘‘It is 

in this realm where the prosecutor picks some person whom he dislikes or desires to embarrass or selects some group or unpopular 

person and then looks for an offense that the greatest danger of 

abuse of prosecuting power lies. 

‘‘It is here that law enforcement becomes personal, and the real 

crime becomes that of being unpopular with the predominant or 

governing group being attached to the wrong political views or 

being personally obnoxious to or in the way of the prosecutor himself.’’

And I do think that is an admonition against prosecutors. I 

would also think it is an admonition against Members of Congress 

in the way we conduct ourselves from time to time, that it is a tremendous temptation to try and find some particular item that we 

can to discredit someone. 

Having said that, Mr. Attorney General Thornburgh, I just want 

to say that I have great respect for you. I can recall when you were 

Attorney General and you had a meeting with Members of my side 

of the aisle, including a number of Members of this panel, some 20 

years ago at which time a Member of this Committee was under 

investigation by your department—and I think you came about 

that close to reading him his Miranda rights during the meeting 

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we had—and the only reason I mention that is I understand the 

difficulty when we have law enforcement with a discretion that is 

given to them through the Constitution and the proper appointment by the President, in your instance, and the political interplay 

that takes place with respect to public policy issues. 

I take very seriously claims of selective prosecution, but I also recall being, as attorney general of California, accused of selective 

prosecution whether you brought a case or you did not bring a case 

whenever there was some political element involved, and I understand how serious and difficult it is for you to make such claims 

in this case, although there are a series of questions that were 

asked you, and I wish I could get into them, but I do not have 

enough time. 

I would like to direct some questions to Mr. Jones. 

On the record, I will just say Don Siegelman’s a friend of mine. 

He served as Attorney General when I was attorney general. I got 

to know him and his wife and his family, and while I would oppose 

selective prosecution of any individual, I would particularly take offense on someone I know and someone I served with and, during 

the time I served with him, found to be a credible and responsible 

person. 

So the allegations that are alleged here are very serious, in my 

estimation, and so I just want to get a feel from you about the prosecutor in the case, the person who actually prosecuted the case and 

the acting U.S. attorney. 

When I received a call from Governor Siegelman’s wife on this, 

I started to make a little bit of an inquiry myself, and one of the 

things I received in response to my inquiry was the statement from 

Louis Franklin on this matter in which he said, ‘‘I can, however, 

state with absolutely certainty that the entire story is misleading 

because Karl Rove had no role whatsoever in bringing about the investigation or prosecution of former Governor Don Siegelman. It is 

intellectually dishonest to even suggest that Mr. Rove influenced or 

had any input into the decision to investigate or prosecute Don 

Siegelman. That decision was made by me, Louis F. Franklin, Sr., 

as the acting U.S. attorney in the case in conjunction with the Department of Justice’s public integrity section and the Alabama attorney general’s office.’’

Now that is a pretty strong statement on his part. I was thinking 

of cases I had in which it turned out when we prosecuted someone, 

it was someone of a high profile of the other party, who there was 

a contention might be a rival of mine in a future race, and, frankly, 

all I could say in response was, ‘‘I did not do it for that purpose. 

I took into account prosecutors.’’

I remember having a number of meetings with my career prosecutors about the quantum of evidence that was there, making 

them go over and over with me that quantum of evidence to convince me that this was a solid case, and so I guess I am trying to 

ask what is it that would have you convince me that this statement 

is erroneous and that Mr. Franklin and the prosecutor in the specific case brought a case in which they did not believe, did it only 

for political purposes? 

And the reason I ask that is this—and, again, I come out of the 

construct of my own experience—in California, the attorney general 

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has supervisory responsibility for all D.A.’s offices. When I was attorney general, I could take over any D.A.’s office. I could not intervene to stop a prosecution, however. I could only intervene to take 

over a prosecution or start one that the D.A. had refused to do, and 

the thinking was that if a prosecution that should have been 

brought was not brought, there is no recourse for the public. 

But if there is a prosecution that is questionable and ought not 

to be brought, the prosecutions are with, in the first case, the 

grand jury, the judge, the appellate court and finally the Supreme 

Court, and that was sort of the framework of California law, and 

I thought it was a fairly reasonable approach to look at things. So, 

when I hear a serious allegation from someone I consider to be a 

friend that there has been selective prosecution, and I look at the 

case, I would just ask you to help me on that, please. 

Mr. JONES. It is a very fair question. Let me make sure you understand. I have never ever said that Louis Franklin or Steve 

Feaga were politically motivated. In fact, I do believe that by the 

time this indictment was rendered, they were invested in the case 

and they believed it. I publically said that before. 

I do not believe, however, though, that Mr. Franklin can make 

any statement anymore than I can about whether or not Karl Rove 

or anyone else at the White House discussed with the public integrity section whether or not to go forward against Don Siegelman. 

All I know is that Mr. Feaga and Mr. Franklin did not think a 

lot of this case, based on my experience and what they said, in the 

summer of 2004. We were told by Mr. Feaga that he was asked to 

go back by the public integrity section and, in fact, that that is 

what happened. 

So, unlike maybe looking at U.S. attorneys, I have never thought 

necessarily that Mr. Feaga or Mr. Franklin were motivated by any 

political motive there. 

Mr. LUNGREN. That goes to the question. When I was dealing 

with some very difficult cases, I told my prosecutors and investigators to go back and look at it, in one case when there did not appear to be sufficient evidence, but we had accusations and in another case where I did not think they had sufficient evidence, and 

that is the normal course of a supervisor, and that is why I am trying to find what is different here, if you could tell me so I could 

figure out what is different. 

Mr. JONES. Congressman, my reaction was in part the same at 

the time. But when you look at the entire timeline and you look 

at the fact that the indictment against Governor Siegelman had 

been dismissed, and then when you look at what actually happened 

in 2005, which was not just simply a review. 

Remember this case had been going on for 2, 21⁄2 years, and the 

allegations were there. This was more than a review. This was 

going back and starting to look at areas that had never been looked 

at before and that, in fact, so many businessmen and others that 

were subpoenaed had to spend time and money with allegations or 

at least looking at areas that never came to fruition. It was a whole 

new investigation, and that is all I can say. 

But I do appreciate your comments because, at the time, my reaction was one of the same. It would not be unusual. I was conVerDate 0ct 09 2002 12:33 Mar 27, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00339 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\CRIME\102307A\38507.000 HJUD1 PsN: 38507
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cerned because of the dismissal, though, previously that they all of 

a sudden come back. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Massachusetts is recognized for his one remaining minute? 

Mr. DELAHUNT. I think it is important that we understand that 

this is an important hearing because it does focus on the integrity 

of the decision-making process of the prosecutor. 

I would like to put aside partisan considerations, irrelevant of 

whether it is a Democrat or a Republican, but I think we have to 

know and have confidence if we are to reassure the American people that the mechanisms, the checks and balances that ensure the 

integrity of that decision-making process are working, that they are 

effective. 

The Ranking Member mentioned the Nifong matter. The state 

took action there. He said we ought to be looking at the Duke Lacrosse case. Well, they did. They did that. 

I think the issue is: Is OPR properly functioning? I do not know 

the answer to that question. 

I also want to comment on Attorney General Thornburgh’s observation about the criminalization of ordinances and county codes, et 

cetera. Do we really want to do this? Is this what we intended 

when we passed these substantive laws? This is something that 

this Committee, Republican and Democrat, has to take a hard look 

at. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

The gentlelady from California is recognized for 5 minutes? 

Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. Wait, wait. Excuse me. Ms. Lofgren. I am sorry. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Chairman, thank you for recognizing me. 

First, I have a letter that has been delivered to us by Timothy 

Hawks, the lawyer for Ms. Thompson who was convicted and whose 

conviction was overturned and, in response, I would ask unanimous 

consent to put that in the record. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

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Ms. LOFGREN. And I just want to raise that issue because when 

we started out on this inquiry, I will confess, I thought we were 

going to find some ineptness and some bungling. I never really believed that we would uncover something that looked very seriously 

wrong and people who, because they were going to risk their job, 

brought prosecutions that should not have been brought. 

And then, of course, that brings us to the question: What about 

the people who did not lose their jobs? What did they do? 

And the case of Ms. Thompson is a pretty stark one. I mean, as 

this letter indicates, the Republican Party sent millions of dollars 

advertising Ms. Thompson as a symbol of corruption of the incumbent Democratic regime, but when her case was heard on appeal, 

the appellate court, the Seventh Circuit, described the government’s evidence as, ‘‘beyond thin,’’ and described the legal theories 

of the prosecution as ‘‘preposterous,’’ and the very day of oral arguments ordered that she be released from custody. 

So my question, Mr. Attorney General and Mr. Jones, are you familiar with another case where the appellate court on the day of 

the oral arguments orders the appellant released with this kind of 

description of the prosecution? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Pretty unusual, I must say. 

Mr. JONES. I think it would be extremely unusual. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Well, it just seems to me it looks not right, and 

I would hope—first, let me say, Mr. Attorney General, that politically we are not aligned, but I do respect your integrity and you 

are what we always thought of on my side of the aisle as an honest 

conservative and that you would stay here today and speak as you 

have in an effort to really, I think, save the country from a souring 

and a corruption of the prosecution process is really in keeping 

with your reputation as an honest conservative, and I appreciate 

it. It cannot be easy to do. I appreciate that you have done this. 

And I hope that all of us in the Congress will get a grip. It is 

time to stop defending the indefensible and time to clean up something that appears to have seriously damaged the integrity of the 

judicial system, which is core to our free society. 

And with that, Mr. Chairman, I would like to yield the balance 

of my time to the gentleman from Alabama, Mr. Artur Davis. 

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, Ms. Lofgren. 

Let me turn to another aspect of this case that has raised questions and ask unanimous consent to introduce a Time magazine article, October 4 of this year, called Selective Justice in Alabama. 

Lanny Young, Mr. Jones, you will recall, in addition to Nick Bailey, was the government’s other principal witness against Don 

Siegelman. Mr. Young indicated that he had bribed Siegelman and 

a number of Siegelman staffers for a number of years. 

According to the Time magazine article, which relies on FBI 

302s, documents turned over to defense lawyers, in May of 2002, 

Mr. Young met with the U.S. attorney’s office, met with individuals 

from the Attorney General’s office and made a series of allegations 

against Republican officeholders, one of them, one of the senators 

from my state, another one, the former Attorney General who is 

now a Federal judge. 

He indicated that he had laundered campaign contributions for 

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lation of Federal campaign finance laws. Quote from the story, 

‘‘Several people involved in the Siegelman case who spoke to Time 

say prosecutors were so focused on going after Siegelman that they 

showed almost no interest in tracking down what Young said about 

apparently illegal contributions to Sessions, Pryor, other wellknown figures in the Alabama GOP, and even a few of the safe 

Democrats.’’

In other words, no matter what Lanny Young said, the only thing 

that the government wanted to hear about was that which related 

to Don Siegelman. Quote from the story, ‘‘It just did not seem like 

that was ever going to happen,’’ that being an investigation of the 

others, ‘‘said an individual present during key parts of the investigation. Sessions and Pryor were on the home team.’’

One of two things happens here, it seems to me. Either the government did not even look into the allegations against these other 

individuals, which raises an obvious question of selectiveness, or 

more likely this, they concluded very quickly that Lanny Young 

was a liar who could not be trusted, and that what he said about 

our senator and our Attorney General had no corroboration, no 

proof. 

I will direct this question to Mr. Thornburgh and Mr. Jones as 

a former Attorney General and a former U.S. attorney. Does the 

government not have ethical obligations to not put someone on the 

stand who appears to be a noncredible witness? 

And, Mr. Thornburgh, would you be troubled if the government 

brought a case based on someone who had made allegations that 

appeared to conclusively be disproved? 

Mr. SCOTT. Can I ask the witnesses to respond briefly? The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. Yes. 

Mr. JONES. Yes. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentleman from Tennessee? 

Mr. COHEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I am concerned about these cases that have been raised, pretty 

much so, but I would like to turn our discussion to a case in Mississippi that Chairman Scott mentioned in his opening statement, 

a case that raises serious questions of selective prosecutions. 

The Committee has received letters from Mississippi Supreme 

Court Justice Oliver Diaz, as well as Mississippi trial lawyer Paul 

Minor and Mississippi attorney and former judge John Whitfield, 

detailing the facts of their prosecutions in Mississippi. They all believe these have been politically motivated. And it is mentioned in 

Justice Diaz’s letter that John Grisham, a distinguished author, 

former member of the Mississippi House of Representatives, has 

written a lot about Mississippi in fiction. It looks like something 

that is even more scary. It looks like a tale of intrigue, of political 

incest in the highest orders and places of the Mississippi Justice 

Department, and attempts to get even with folks on the other side 

of the aisle. 

I would like first to ask unanimous consent that the three letters 

that we have received from the justice, the attorney and the former 

judge be included in the record. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection. 

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Mr. COHEN. Thank you, sir. 

In what Justice Diaz, who is the sitting member of the Mississippi Supreme Court, describes, ‘‘as a scheme hatched by politically corrupt employees of the United States Department of Justice 

and elsewhere,’’ in 2003, the United States attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi, Mr. Lampton, prosecuted Justice Diaz, 

Mr. Minor, Mr. Whitfield, another judge and Justice Diaz’s ex-wife 

based on allegations that Mr. Minor attempted to gain an unfair 

advantage from the judges by guaranteeing loans in the 2000 campaign when Justice Diaz was running for judge, a man who was 

a Republican but had Democratic friends over the years, against a 

man named Starrett who was a good 100 percent silk stocking Republican with all the things that Republicans do to be in good 

graces, a loyal Bushie, so to speak. 

In that particular election in 2000, Mr. Minor made guaranteed 

loans to the candidate running for justice, Mr. Diaz, at approximately $65,000. That was legal in Mississippi. It is perfectly legal 

under Mississippi law. Another gentleman, Mr. Richard Dickie 

Scruggs, made loans of $80,000 to Justice Diaz, the same election. 

There are differences. And you start to see the branching of justice 

and the definite questions which this Committee, Mr. Chairman, 

needs to look into. 

After that 2000 election, you have the same set of facts. Two 

legal guaranteed loans made to this Supreme Court justice candidate, one by Mr. Diaz and one by Mr. Minor. Yet in 2003, Justice 

Diaz, Mr. Minor, Mr. Whitfield, then a judge, another judge and 

Mr. Diaz’s wife are all indicted. They are indicted in July of 2003, 

even though Justice Diaz had recused himself from every case he 

had ever had dealing with Mr. Minor, never voted on a thing, but 

he is indicted. 

He is indicted because he guaranteed these loans to this man 

running for the Supreme Court. Mr. Scruggs guaranteed a loan at 

a higher amount of money, repaid those loans himself rather than 

raising money as Mr. Minor did. Accordingly, Mr. Scruggs is more 

ingratiated, so to speak, with the justice than Mr. Minor would 

have been, but Mr. Scruggs is not indicted. 

Well, what is the difference in the two situations according to 

these letters? Well, if you look at them, Mr. Minor was one of the 

largest donors to the Democrats in that state, one of the 10 top donors to John Edwards’ Presidential campaign and was known for 

his support as a trial lawyer in working for the people’s interest 

and against the tobacco interests. 

On the other hand, Mr. Scruggs, also a trial lawyer, also a trial 

lawyer, had after that election given half a million dollars to Republican causes, a quarter of a million dollars to the Bush-Cheney 

campaign, and, coincidentally or not, is the brother-in-law of Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi. Well, Mr. Scruggs not indicted and 

apparently not even investigated. 

It is this suggestion of politically motivated selective prosecution 

that raises the question of whether the prosecution of Justice Diaz 

and Mr. Minor fits in the larger potential pattern of selective prosecution that we are discussing today. 

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dicted. And when you read through these letters and you see a pattern of relationships and conflicts of interest that are not taken 

into consideration by the court on the part of Mr. Lampton who 

twice ran for Congress as a Republican, was constantly the opposition of Mr. Minor—he was his foil, his antithesis—and Mr. Minor 

had sued a Fortune 500 company which Mr. Lampton’s family is 

involved in—Mr. Lampton does not recuse himself. He brings a 

prosecution looking apparently at the man first and the facts later 

and prosecutes and conflict of interest did not discuss. 

What I would like to ask in this situation is——

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Chairman, the time has long expired. 

Mr. COHEN. I would just like to ask the Chairman if he could 

look into and include in this particular hearing discussions of 

whether selective prosecution, politically motivated, happened in 

Mississippi with these Democratic officeholders and include the 

Mississippi case in the document requests that are made and ask 

the Committee to make this case a full part of its inquiry. If you 

look at it, it does an injustice to the State of Mississippi, to Lady 

Justice and to what we know as fair play in America. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

We have a Committee hearing in this room at 1. That will begin 

at the conclusion of this hearing. 

Next is the gentlelady from California, Ms. Waters? 

Ms. WATERS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

I would like to first just congratulate you for this hearing. This 

is extremely important, and I would think that all the Members of 

this Committee from both sides of the aisle would be supportive of 

this hearing and work that should be done to ensure that the citizens of this country can depend on the criminal justice system and 

the Justice Department to be impartial, to be fair and not single 

out or political profile elected officials and basically politicize the 

process. So I am very thankful to you. 

I would just like to turn to Mr. Shields. 

Professor Shields, earlier, you were asked whether or not you 

were an attorney, and you were also asked if you had a degree in 

statistics. I would like to debunk the notion that being an attorney 

would somehow make you a better researcher or would make you 

a better professor——

Mr. SHIELDS. Thank you. 

Ms. WATERS [continuing]. Or would somehow give you more 

credibility than the professor emeritus that you are, the Department of Communications, University of Missouri, St. Louis, and 

lecturer, Department of Communications Studies at the University 

of Missouri, Kansas City. You are, indeed, professor emeritus, Department of Communication, University of Missouri, St. Louis. Is 

that true? 

Mr. SHIELDS. That is true. 

Ms. WATERS. And you are published? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. 

Ms. WATERS. Have you ever been accused of having sloppy research or having published something that proved to be untrue or 

statistically incorrect? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Not to my knowledge. 

372

Ms. WATERS. Is it true that when you started out the work that 

led you to where you have come in looking at the political profiling 

that that is not where you started out. You were looking for something else. Is that correct? 

Mr. SHIELDS. That is correct. 

Ms. WATERS. Would you tell the Committee what it was you were 

researching when you stumbled upon this political profiling? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. As I said in my opening statement, I was 

studying rhetorical visions and had noted that with the end of 

Communism, why there was not a dominant conservative theme, 

piece of rhetoric around, and then John Ashcroft, who happens to 

be from my state, Missouri, and was once our attorney general, was 

once our governor, was once our United States senator before becoming Attorney General for the Nation, began a public corruption 

initiative, and so I was studying to see if people were caught up 

in this new vision, and he was running around not only the country 

giving speeches on public corruption, but he was running around 

the world giving speeches on public corruption. 

Ms. WATERS. And——

Mr. SHIELDS. So I was studying this. 

Ms. WATERS. As you describe this, this was a kind of new approach to preemptive strike on corruption——

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes, that is correct. 

Ms. WATERS [continuing]. That Mr. Ashcroft was talking about? 

Mr. SHIELDS. It was a move away from investigating and prosecuting actual crimes to kind of ferreting them out before they happened. 

Ms. WATERS. And in your research, you had discovered that 

there had been 375 investigations and-or indictments of candidates 

and elected officials brought by U.S. attorneys since 2001. 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. 

Ms. WATERS. Would you reiterate again for us and would you 

give us the percentages of indictments relative to Democrats and 

Republicans? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. As I also said in my opening remarks, the 

written statement that I provided for the public record for here 

now has 820 investigations, not just 375. So I will just give you the 

new numbers. And the new numbers are 5.6 to 1 Democrats investigated versus each Republican. So, for every Republican in this 

room, if you were investigated, there would be 5.6 Democrats that 

were investigated along with you by this Justice Department. 

Ms. WATERS. You did much of your research from news reports, 

and you mentioned that you were Googling and——

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. 

Ms. WATERS [continuing]. Going on the Internet. Did you find it 

odd that so much was being written about what appeared to be the 

political profiling of elected officials? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, what is interesting is by looking at investigations at the local level, what I was really looking at was little 

newspaper stories from all over the country about little local candidates and those stories did not get publicized in other newspapers. So, if you were not reading the Birmingham News, you did 

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cles and you would know. So it was the collective unity of all of 

those small newspapers across the country that enabled me to 

come up with 120 cases through September 16, which is when Attorney General Gonzales stepped down. 

Ms. WATERS. Aside from questions that have basically, I think, 

attempted to discredit you and your work, do you find it odd that 

the Justice Department has refused to give information to this 

Committee or to you or anybody else who would request it that 

would further help to illuminate exactly what has been going on 

and if, in fact, they have not been profiling, they could clear up the 

questions that are being raised or, if they are, we would have more 

information by which to do our oversight and do the corrections? 

Do you find that odd? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes, I do find that odd. There is no doubt that the 

Justice Department has this data and, if they would release it, we 

would know the answers to just how accurate my study is tomorrow morning. 

I can tell you that in New Jersey, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey is very proud of the fact that he goes after elected officials, and 

he announces periodically an update on the number of actual elected officials that he has investigated and prosecuted, and his last 

statement was on September the 24th, and he said he had 124. 

Well, I have 116 of those in my database, and so it would seem to 

me that I am within about 10 percent of having a census of the investigations that are out there. 

Ms. WATERS. Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from Ohio is recognized. She has by unanimous 

consent yielded her time to the gentleman from Alabama. 

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me thank all of my colleagues for being so generous in yielding time for me to bring out as many facts as I could regarding this 

case. This is not a jury, but I do feel the public is owed some conclusions. I am about to give one Member’s conclusions. 

Ms. Siegelman and her two children are here today, and I will 

tell all three of you very candidly that 6 months ago, if you had 

asked me if you could rely that the system that prosecuted your father and your husband had integrity, 6 months ago, I would have 

told you that I believe in the system. I cannot sit here today and 

say to you that I have confidence that the system worked in a fair 

and just manner in this case. I will tell you just some of the reasons. 

At every turn, we see politics. Government was very eager to 

prosecute Don Siegelman in 2002, sat down with a man named 

Lanny Young, listened to what he had to say. The only time they 

believed him is when he talked about Don Siegelman. That suggests selectiveness. 

We know there has been a lot of dispute around the credibility 

of this lady, Jill Simpson. None of us has a truth detector. I do 

know this much. She made her statements under oath in May, it 

took until this morning for countering affidavits to make their way 

to this Committee, and what do all the countering affidavits say? 

No phone call on November 18, 2002. Did not happen. Pull the 

phone records. Jill Simpson called Rob Riley’s office on November 

374

18, 2002. Do not have a truth serum, but I know on that critical 

point the countering affidavits are disproven and she is bolstered. 

Look at Doug Jones’s testimony. He describes a U.S. attorney’s 

office that was all set to walk away from this case, had doubts 

about its own witnesses, ready to close the books. All of a sudden, 

Washington comes in. By the way, Washington comes in in the 

very timeframe that Simpson said she was told they came in, the 

very timeframe she says she was told that Rove intervened, and all 

of a sudden, the Department of Justice begins to run the show. 

What do we know about this Department of Justice? We know 

that it purged U.S. attorneys for being insufficiently loyal Bushies, 

and that is not my phrase. That is the phrase of one of the people 

who worked in the Department of Justice. We know that this Department of Justice had a pattern of disproportionate prosecutions 

so steep and so mountainous that the odds are 10,000 to one 

against it. We know that. 

Every time you look at the twists and turns in this case, you see 

the presence of party politics. So I have to conclude this much. 

Before that, let me make this other one observation. Mr. Lungren, I am with you. This is a mystery to me, too, because I know 

a lot of these individuals. I like the prosecutors in the Montgomery 

office. I served with them, know them to be good men. I wonder 

how in the world they got pulled into bringing a case so lacking in 

merit that they wanted to walk away from it. 

Maybe this is the best answer. Maybe we ought to stop asking 

who is lying and who is telling the truth because we cannot sort 

that and focus on this one question: Could it be that there was 

such a culture that the Gonzales Justice Department created that 

good prosecutors were somehow pulled into it and that they believed the only way to maybe earn spurs in this department is to 

go out and turn the U.S. attorney’s office into a political tool? 

Maybe they came to believe the only way to advance is to use this 

office to get political enemies. Maybe before they even knew it, they 

started to think the U.S. attorney’s office was just another thing 

to be used, another piece of opposition research to be put on the 

table. 

I would like to think that was not the case, but that is the culture that I see tainted by all of this evidence. So I think, ladies and 

gentleman, Members of the Committee, politics influenced this 

case. That is the irresistible conclusion based on the facts—Washington politics, Karl Rove politics—and finally, the politics that 

says if I cannot beat your ideas, if I cannot have confidence that 

I can beat you at the ballot box, maybe I can do it the old-fashioned 

way and just destroy you and destroy your reputation. 

Ladies and gentleman, if that is what U.S. attorneys’ offices and 

the Department of Justice becomes, it eats away at the integrity 

of this whole system. People who have committed crimes ought to 

go to jail, but, Mr. Jones, you said it better than anyone could say 

it today. Diligent prosecutors unaffected by politics investigate 

crimes, not people in search of a theory hoping that they can put 

them in the dock. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson Lee? 

375

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Chairman, I heard a comment as I was 

coming into the room that this has been devastating. I want to 

thank the distinguished panel for their presence here, and thank 

you for your indulgence of this timeframe. I thank the Chairmen 

of the joint Committees for their leadership on this issue. 

I just want to quickly make a point on the record, and then I am 

going to go right at some pointed questions. My colleagues have 

been certainly direct. 

I hear the constant refrain of Karl Rove, and I would say to my 

Chairpersons that it seems that he should be in this room. Karl 

Rove has had his name engaged repeatedly in the whole episode 

and debacle dealing with the fired U.S. attorneys. It seems that 

those U.S. attorneys were from swing states, the very places that 

a political Karl Rove would want to win. Karl Rove has a long history with Alabama, and he seems to have been able to engineer the 

GOP takeover of Alabama in the 1990’s. We know that our President has been to Alabama. 

Mr. SCOTT. Will the gentlelady suspend for just a minute? 

I understand that Mr. Jones has a flight that he might be able 

to make if he leaves right this minute. 

Mr. JONES. It is close. 

Mr. SCOTT. Are there any questions to Mr. Jones? If not, you are 

excused. 

Mr. JONES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you, Mr. Jones. 

As well, we know that Governor Siegelman was someone who 

changed the landscape, if you will, of politics in Alabama. 

So, Mr. Jones, as you leave, let me thank you and just simply 

say: Do you think they were out to get Mr. Siegelman, and I will 

let you go at that. 

Mr. JONES. I do not think there is any question that there were 

a lot of people out to get him. Yes, ma’am. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. No question? 

Mr. JONES. No question. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you for that answer. 

Let me pose my questions quickly to the two gentlemen. I would 

say to you, Professor Shields, in looking at the numbers, do you 

think that it might have been a thought that we could command 

that they were out to get Governor Siegelman? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, I only know about the dismissal and then the 

second re-indictment. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Yes. 

Mr. SHIELDS. I go by the fact that there was a dismissal and then 

there was a sudden re-indictment. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And so that looks like a turn of events out of 

the ordinary? 

Mr. SHIELDS. Yes. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Let me for the record indicate that one of my 

colleagues mentioned Mr. Jefferson. Let me make it very clear that 

I think your numbers encapture his circumstances, but I think it 

is important for our colleagues to note on the record Mr. Jefferson 

has been protesting and presenting his innocence and it is one of 

the longest cases we have ever seen in comparing it other cases. 

It was the personal choice of any Member of Congress who decided 

376

to plea. It was their personal choice. To date, Mr. Jefferson has not, 

and he has continued to insist on his innocence, and I think that 

speaks volumes. 

I do want to go to this line of questioning about inaction. We 

have talked about selective prosecution, and, General Thornburgh, 

I want you to know that we have respected your legacy in civil 

rights. Those of us who have studied generals and understand we 

have heard your voice being very strong. 

So I am going to pose you a question and this is on inertia, but 

I do want to hear a little bit about Dr. Wecht, a 75-year-old, because that speaks to discretion and judgment and why someone 

who seemed to have the association with maybe more liberal viewpoints might have been subjected to selective prosecution. 

I want to bring up the gentleman in Chicago that was a Democratic fundraiser, Professor Shields, if you happen to know about 

that individual who was asked to roll over and did not roll over, 

but, more importantly, was told if you roll over, you will go free. 

But really I want you to get at this question of lack of enforcement. In the Western District of Louisiana in the Jena 6 case, 

there was a sitting U.S. attorney who kept his job who was an appointee who did not see fit to investigate or pursue the idea of 

hanging nooses, the idea of disparate treatment—it was on the 

state level—but the idea of civil rights prosecution, meaning going 

forward to suggest that the abuse of a student, taking a gun out, 

beating up a Black student, even though we do not condone the actions—we are not condoning the actions of those youngsters—but 

if you would speak to the two points I gave you and then this question of selective inertia where the U.S. attorney could have been effective but for politics possibly holding him back. 

General Thornburgh, you want to speak on your case and then 

if you would to the other points I have made. 

Mr. THORNBURGH. As I told the Committee earlier, Representative Jackson Lee, I have a hard time figuring out why the U.S. attorney would go to such lengths to convert these trivial irregularities into Federal felony charges. When I look at it in the context 

of her having carried out no investigations or prosecutions against 

Republicans and bringing this case against a prominent Democrat 

and measure that against the backdrop of the allegations of nationwide actions of a similar ilk, I can only come to the conclusion that 

the prosecution was politically motivated. 

I was asked earlier whether I had any evidence of conversations 

between the White House or Federal officials. No, I do not, obviously, have those, but I look at this and I try my best to come up 

with some other explanation as to why these charges might have 

been brought, and I come up empty-handed. 

I must apologize for being unable to comment on the Jena case. 

I simply do not know, obviously, with any degree of certainty that 

I have about the case I am discussing where I represent the individual who is the subject, a target of this investigation the facts, 

and it would be, I think you would agree, irresponsible for me to 

offer an opinion on that in that context. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Professor Shields, inertia in prosecution? Selective nonprosecution? 

377

Mr. SHIELDS. Well, in regard to the cases that are not of elected 

officials or candidates, I did not study those. I can tell you that I 

have run across a number of investigations of fundraisers. Now 

which political party these fundraisers are of, I do not know, but 

I did not track them as a database. 

I think there is no doubt that the data speaks that something 

caused this irregularity, this disproportion between investigations 

of Democrats and investigations of Republicans. It was either policy driven, which I suspect—the data and the other circumstantial 

evidence that this has been brought up here today and in previous 

months by the Judiciary Committee suggests its policy driven. But 

even if it were a result of just independent U.S. attorneys acting, 

it is a bad thing. It is not good to investigate 5.6 Democrats to 

every one Republican. When the ratio should be 1.2 Democrats to 

one Republican. 

So, even if it is not policy driven, it is something that this Committee and the Congress needs to enact certain structural changes 

that will prohibit that from continuing. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And the same thing with inaction? 

Mr. SHIELDS. And the same thing. I mean, prosecutors have always had discretion not to bow out of a case, but there does not 

seem to be any harm in that. But there is harm if it is done selectively. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from Wisconsin, Ms. Baldwin? 

Ms. BALDWIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the fact 

that you are holding this hearing today, and I certainly appreciate 

the patient panel of witnesses for coming to speak with us today. 

I had actually intended to ask my question of Mr. Jones, but I 

will offer these witnesses an opportunity to respond. 

But I want to use my time to address the case that has been 

very, very controversial in my home state of Wisconsin, the prosecution of a state employee by the name of Georgia Thompson. 

Many, I think, are already familiar with the Georgia Thompson 

case. 

She was a procurement officer for the State of Wisconsin, a civil 

servant who was hired during the term of a Republican governor, 

and she was criminally prosecuted on charges that she awarded a 

contract to a firm owned by someone who had made campaign donations to our Democratic governor. 

The case raised a lot of question marks when the Seventh Circuit 

Appeals Court reversed her conviction last April calling the government’s evidence ‘‘beyond thin’’ and describing the government’s 

legal theories as essentially ‘‘preposterous,’’ and in a very unusual 

move, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals issued an order the 

very day of oral arguments directing the government, the authorities to release Ms. Thompson immediately before close of business 

that day, at oral arguments. 

When it became clear that Ms. Thompson had not even known 

about the donations and the winning bidder had submitted the lowest bid, the question became even more urgent. Why was this 

woman prosecuted and sent to prison? 

Well, one possible answer is suggested in a letter submitted to 

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resent Ms. Thompson, and I would like to ask, Mr. Chairman, 

unanimous consent to enter that letter into the record. 

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Mr. SCOTT. Without objection, so ordered. 

Ms. BALDWIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I especially commend the letter to my colleagues because it really 

catalogs the awful personal toll that this prosecution on Ms. 

Thompson produced. She in the course of this prosecution to defend 

herself and her good name spent approximately $360,000, exhausting her entire life savings, in the course of the prosecution, lost her 

job and her home, facts, I think, that we should never lose sight 

of when we consider these cases and their consequences. 

As to why the case might have been brought, the letter also describes the prosecution as highly politicized. It further states, ‘‘The 

context of the prosecution of Ms. Thompson was a dangerous mix 

of partisan electoral politics.’’

Following Ms. Thompson’s release after 4 months in Federal 

prison, The New York Times editorialized that U.S. Attorney 

Biskupic had turned a flimsy case into a campaign issue that nearly helped Republicans win a pivotal governor’s race. 

The letter goes on to question why the case was brought in the 

Milwaukee Federal court instead of Madison where Ms. Thompson 

lived, the contract was executed, where she worked, and questions 

the timing of the indictment and the trial alongside the timing of 

a heated electoral campaign. 

Quoting again from the letter, ‘‘During that time, the Republican 

Party spent millions of dollars on advertising specifically portraying Ms. Thompson as a symbol of corruption of the incumbent 

Democratic regime. It is clear that the prosecution was politically 

useful to Republicans, but, at this point, of course, we do not know 

if that was a side effect or if the prosecution was, in fact, politically 

motivated.’’

Now U.S. Attorney Biskupic, who is respected in the State of 

Wisconsin, has strongly denied this, and I have not formed a judgment on that ultimate issue, and I have an open mind, but we do 

know a few things. 

First, we know that for a time, Mr. Biskupic’s name was on the 

U.S. attorney’s firing list, and he appears to have been removed 

from that list after the Thompson indictment was brought. 

Second, we know that Karl Rove was concerned about so-called 

vote fraud enforcement in Mr. Biskupic’s district, and other U.S. 

attorneys who were not aggressive enough on those cases to satisfy 

Republican interests do appear to have actually been fired. 

Finally, we know that the Seventh Circuit has told us that this 

was not just a weak case. It appears to have been simply an unreasonable one. It is one thing to have a conviction reversed. It is 

quite another thing altogether for an appeals court to reverse a 

conviction, to ridicule the prosecution and to order the government 

to release the defendant before the close of business that very day. 

So, on that note, I will give you two the question I was going to 

give to Mr. Jones. Are you aware of the frequency of criminal convictions, especially those reversed in that fashion and, if not, what 

would you reaction have been to something like that? 

Mr. THORNBURGH. May I speak to that, Mr. Chairman? 

Mr. SCOTT. Yes, Mr. Thornburgh? 

385

Mr. THORNBURGH. I ask to do so because the findings of the Seventh Circuit Court in the Thompson case relate directly to the 

grievance that I presented to this Committee today. 

In the opinion rendered by the Seventh Circuit, a distinguished 

Federal judge, Frank Easterbrook—I must make full disclosure, a 

former colleague of mine at the Department of Justice, but a respected Federal judge—expressed the growing misgivings that Federal courts have about overzealous applications of section 666 and 

1346 of the Federal Code, the very sections that we have pointed 

out were abused in the Wecht prosecution. 

And knowing that this Committee is interested not only in hearing grievances, but in taking constructive action to prevent this 

from recurring, I would refer you to Judge Easterbrook’s suggestion 

that Congress take another look at the wisdom of enacting ambulatory criminal prohibitions, which is a fancy way of saying prohibitions that are adjustable to the moment and can be fashioned in 

the manner that has been discussed today. 

I would ask on behalf of all those defendants whose cases have 

been discussed here today involving these open-ended kinds of opportunities that the Congress might be well-advised in its oversight 

hearings to look at these particular statutes and the opportunity 

for abuse that lies within having such vague and open-ended admonitions in the Federal Criminal Code. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. 

Mr. Shields? 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I have a unanimous consent, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SCOTT. For what? 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. To put two names on the record that I did not 

mention in my remarks. 

Mr. SCOTT. The gentlelady will state the names. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Yes, I would like to put on the record Democratic contributor Peter Palivos that I was mentioning in my remarks and also former Councilmember Ben Reyes from Houston 

who was subjected to prosecution under the hotel sting operation 

in Houston, Texas. 

I yield back. 

Mr. SCOTT. Without objection. 

I want to thank our witnesses for their testimony today. Members may have additional written questions which we will forward 

to you and ask that you answer as promptly as you can in order 

that they may be made part of the record. 

Without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 1 

week for the submission of additional materials, and without objection, the Committee stands adjourned. 

We will begin the next hearing as soon as we can get set up. 

[Whereupon, at 1:30 p.m., the Subcommittees were adjourned.] 

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