Anchorage—
The headline on the Associated Press article was “Low-key Harley lover running Stevens investigation.”
A casual reading of the article shouts: “Fun!” Henry Schuelke, the newly selected special prosecutor probing the work of the prosecutors in the Ted Stevens trial, drives a Porsche to work, likes fast motorcycles, and gives great parties even while avoiding grandstanding.
But the reader can’t just focus on the headline and the human-interest highlights. I’ve never met this guy, but I know he is not merely the coolest uncle you could ever imagine. You don’t get to be one of the most successful and respected lawyers specializing in white-collar criminal defense unless you’re real smart and real tough.
A more complete account of Schuelke’s personality and approach to his work can be found in the book The Man to See by Evan Thomas. The book is a biography of legendary lawyer Edward Bennett Williams, the founding partner of the law firm Williams & Connolly. That firm represented Ted Stevens, and Stevens’ lead trial attorney was Brendan Sullivan, a protégé of Williams.
While serving as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in 1978, Schuelke beat Williams in a public corruption trial in Washington, D.C. The wisecracking Schuelke worked during the trial to throw his iconic opponent off his stride. Williams owned the Washington Redskins professional football team. If the Redskins lost on Sunday, Schuelke would sidle up to Williams and say “‘Hey Ed, I’ve been busy. What happened? Skins win?’”
After Williams lost the trial, his firm asked the judge to throw the verdict out based on juror misconduct. After Schuelke asked whether Williams had learned this information before the verdict and tucked it away to use in case he needed it, the defense attorney had to go on the stand himself in post-trial proceedings and defend his integrity.
Williams ultimately got the verdict thrown out and the case re-tried in Philadelphia. He won the re-trial, but it was clear that he didn’t view his experience up against Schuelke as some sort of unalloyed triumph. “‘Victory?’ Williams said when someone stopped to congratulate him. ‘All we did was split a doubleheader.’”
Schuelke’s comment on his opponent’s conduct gives some insight into his nuanced view of lawyer’s ethics in ligitation. “‘Williams played the game with a little chalk on his shoes, but he’s no different from any other lawyer in a hotly contested suit. You take advantage wherever you can get it.'"
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Saturday, April 11, 2009
What Happened, What It Looked Like, and What It Means (Part Three)
Anchorage--
Legally speaking, the first thing to know about this dismissal is that the jury verdict finding Ted Stevens guilty of seven felony counts has been set aside and—in the words of Judge Sullivan—“has no legal effect.”
As Judge Sullivan also noted in his written order of dismissal, he never issued a judgment of conviction that would have imposed sentence on the former Senator. As a result, in a technical sense Ted Stevens was correct when he asserted right after the verdict that he had not been convicted.
Reflecting the reality that the court’s setting aside of the jury verdict eliminated any legal disability for the former Senator, the Alaska Bar Association moved immediately after the court’s dismissal of the indictment to withdraw the motion for interim suspension of Ted Stevens’ license to practice law in the 49th State. The Alaska Bar Association had made that motion after the jury said “Guilty” seven times last October, but the Legal Times reported that the Alaska Supreme Court had not yet taken action by the time of Judge Sullivan’s setting aside of the jury verdict. (A court in the District of Columbia had issued an interim suspension of Stevens’ D.C. law license in December, but the Legal Times also reported on April 9 that the licensing authority in our nation’s capital is also expected to move to lift that suspension in the wake of Judge Sullivan’s order.)
There are two more outstanding—and interrelated—questions about the future:
A. What happens to the trial prosecutors in the Ted Stevens case?
B. What happens to the federal investigation into public corruption in Alaska?
I wrote about these subjects at some length 10 days ago when the Attorney General threw in the towel, but that was before Judge Sullivan has ordered his own investigation of the trial prosecutors’ handling of evidence and witnesses to go along with the already-ongoing internal investigation by the Department of Justice.
I will have more to write later about these topics. The short answers to Questions A and B above are that all this scrutiny of the trial prosecutors (and lead investigators) both makes the lives of those federal employees very difficult and tends to put up barriers to the successful prosecution of additional targets in the underlying investigation into Alaska public corruption.
For today, I point you to two articles:
Ashby Jones, Wall Street Journal Law Blog, “Pregaming the Ted Stevens-Prosecutors Investigation,” found at http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2009/04/08/pregaming-the-ted-stevens-prosecutors-investigation/
William Yardley, New York Times, New Scrutiny of Other Alaska Corruption Cases,” found at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/09/us/politics/09stevens.html (note that the article misspells the last name of former state Rep. Bruce Weyhrauch)
Coming up:
What’s the story on Henry Schuelke, the private attorney selected by Judge Sullivan as the special prosecutor investigating the work of the trial prosecutors in the Ted Stevens case?
What is the likelihood that Ted Stevens will seek to get his legal fees paid by the Department of Justice?
Why did the Department of Justice charge Ted Stevens with felony counts alleging financial disclosure violations so close to an election?
Why did these discovery problems occur in the prosecution?
Why did Ted Stevens push so hard for a quick trial?
What would have happened if Ted Stevens hadn’t pushed so hard for a quick trial?
Legally speaking, the first thing to know about this dismissal is that the jury verdict finding Ted Stevens guilty of seven felony counts has been set aside and—in the words of Judge Sullivan—“has no legal effect.”
As Judge Sullivan also noted in his written order of dismissal, he never issued a judgment of conviction that would have imposed sentence on the former Senator. As a result, in a technical sense Ted Stevens was correct when he asserted right after the verdict that he had not been convicted.
Reflecting the reality that the court’s setting aside of the jury verdict eliminated any legal disability for the former Senator, the Alaska Bar Association moved immediately after the court’s dismissal of the indictment to withdraw the motion for interim suspension of Ted Stevens’ license to practice law in the 49th State. The Alaska Bar Association had made that motion after the jury said “Guilty” seven times last October, but the Legal Times reported that the Alaska Supreme Court had not yet taken action by the time of Judge Sullivan’s setting aside of the jury verdict. (A court in the District of Columbia had issued an interim suspension of Stevens’ D.C. law license in December, but the Legal Times also reported on April 9 that the licensing authority in our nation’s capital is also expected to move to lift that suspension in the wake of Judge Sullivan’s order.)
There are two more outstanding—and interrelated—questions about the future:
A. What happens to the trial prosecutors in the Ted Stevens case?
B. What happens to the federal investigation into public corruption in Alaska?
I wrote about these subjects at some length 10 days ago when the Attorney General threw in the towel, but that was before Judge Sullivan has ordered his own investigation of the trial prosecutors’ handling of evidence and witnesses to go along with the already-ongoing internal investigation by the Department of Justice.
I will have more to write later about these topics. The short answers to Questions A and B above are that all this scrutiny of the trial prosecutors (and lead investigators) both makes the lives of those federal employees very difficult and tends to put up barriers to the successful prosecution of additional targets in the underlying investigation into Alaska public corruption.
For today, I point you to two articles:
Ashby Jones, Wall Street Journal Law Blog, “Pregaming the Ted Stevens-Prosecutors Investigation,” found at http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2009/04/08/pregaming-the-ted-stevens-prosecutors-investigation/
William Yardley, New York Times, New Scrutiny of Other Alaska Corruption Cases,” found at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/09/us/politics/09stevens.html (note that the article misspells the last name of former state Rep. Bruce Weyhrauch)
Coming up:
What’s the story on Henry Schuelke, the private attorney selected by Judge Sullivan as the special prosecutor investigating the work of the trial prosecutors in the Ted Stevens case?
What is the likelihood that Ted Stevens will seek to get his legal fees paid by the Department of Justice?
Why did the Department of Justice charge Ted Stevens with felony counts alleging financial disclosure violations so close to an election?
Why did these discovery problems occur in the prosecution?
Why did Ted Stevens push so hard for a quick trial?
What would have happened if Ted Stevens hadn’t pushed so hard for a quick trial?
Thursday, April 9, 2009
What Happened, What It Looked Like, and What It Means (Part Two)
Anchorage—
Given that I did not attend the hearing, the best way to present the human side of what happened at Tuesday’s hearing in the Ted Stevens case is to offer extended quotations from the accounts of three sets of reporters who were there:
John Bresnahan in Politico.com:
When the dismissal was announced, some Stevens family members sobbed audibly, and Stevens gave a raised-fist salute to the audience. There was applause in the courtroom as the hearing concluded, and Stevens was greeted by friends, including Richard Ben-Veniste, a prominent D.C. lawyer.
Stevens himself was more grateful than bitter in his courtroom comments.
"Without your experience and vigilance, the truth would never be known," Stevens told Judge Sullivan. "I've had a long career. I served the United States for many years. Until recently, my faith in the criminal system, the judicial system, was unwavering. But what some members of the prosecution team did nearly destroyed that faith. Their conduct has consequences for me that that they will never realize and can never be reversed."
Stevens added: "Today ... my faith has been restored. ... Your actions gave me new hope that others may be spared of similar miscarriages of justice."
-----
Mike Scarcella and Joe Palazzolo, Legal Times:
Stevens individually thanked the [new team of] prosecutors at their table, shaking their hands. [Chief Stevens defense lawyer] Brendan Sullivan praised the new team of lawyers. “But for honest prosecutors, the system would not work,” Sullivan said. He added that the prosecutors knew a loss in the case would be a blight on their careers, and so they flouted the rules to ensure they would win. “The fear of loss drove them to do what they did,” he said.
-----
Nedra Pickler and Matt Apuzzo, Associated Press, via Fairbanks Daily News-Miner:
...Stevens gave what amounted to the election victory speech he never had a chance to give. Standing at the courtroom lectern wearing a pin of the U.S. and Alaska flags on his sweater, he recounted his career in government - from flying planes in World War II to serving as U.S. attorney to his storied career in the Senate.
He thanked his friends, his supporters and his wife. And he vowed to push his friends in the Senate for tough new laws on prosecutorial misconduct.
Then, with the prosecution team feeling the scrutiny that Stevens felt for years, he smiled, posed for pictures with his family outside the courthouse and said:
"I'm going to enjoy this wonderful day."
Given that I did not attend the hearing, the best way to present the human side of what happened at Tuesday’s hearing in the Ted Stevens case is to offer extended quotations from the accounts of three sets of reporters who were there:
John Bresnahan in Politico.com:
When the dismissal was announced, some Stevens family members sobbed audibly, and Stevens gave a raised-fist salute to the audience. There was applause in the courtroom as the hearing concluded, and Stevens was greeted by friends, including Richard Ben-Veniste, a prominent D.C. lawyer.
Stevens himself was more grateful than bitter in his courtroom comments.
"Without your experience and vigilance, the truth would never be known," Stevens told Judge Sullivan. "I've had a long career. I served the United States for many years. Until recently, my faith in the criminal system, the judicial system, was unwavering. But what some members of the prosecution team did nearly destroyed that faith. Their conduct has consequences for me that that they will never realize and can never be reversed."
Stevens added: "Today ... my faith has been restored. ... Your actions gave me new hope that others may be spared of similar miscarriages of justice."
-----
Mike Scarcella and Joe Palazzolo, Legal Times:
Stevens individually thanked the [new team of] prosecutors at their table, shaking their hands. [Chief Stevens defense lawyer] Brendan Sullivan praised the new team of lawyers. “But for honest prosecutors, the system would not work,” Sullivan said. He added that the prosecutors knew a loss in the case would be a blight on their careers, and so they flouted the rules to ensure they would win. “The fear of loss drove them to do what they did,” he said.
-----
Nedra Pickler and Matt Apuzzo, Associated Press, via Fairbanks Daily News-Miner:
...Stevens gave what amounted to the election victory speech he never had a chance to give. Standing at the courtroom lectern wearing a pin of the U.S. and Alaska flags on his sweater, he recounted his career in government - from flying planes in World War II to serving as U.S. attorney to his storied career in the Senate.
He thanked his friends, his supporters and his wife. And he vowed to push his friends in the Senate for tough new laws on prosecutorial misconduct.
Then, with the prosecution team feeling the scrutiny that Stevens felt for years, he smiled, posed for pictures with his family outside the courthouse and said:
"I'm going to enjoy this wonderful day."
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
What Happened, What Did It Look Like, and What Does It Mean? (Part One)
Anchorage—
The trial judge dismissed the Ted Stevens case as expected, but went on to blast the trial prosecutors’ failures in turning over evidence and to order up his own criminal investigation into that failure.
By all reports, it was quite a hearing yesterday. I was thousands of miles away from that hearing, so what follows is mostly based on the reporting of the Anchorage Daily News, the New York Times, Politico.com, the Alaska Public Radio Network, National Public Radio, the Associated Press, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times.
Let’s take the announcement, the atmospherics, and the ramifications in order.
The Judge Drops Another Bomb on the Shellshocked Justice Department
U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan announced that he had asked a private attorney to investigate the failures of the trial prosecutors to turn over evidence to the defense as legally required. That attorney will be Henry “Hank” Schuelke, a former Assistant U.S. Attorney who served as a prosecutor and a judge in the Army. (More on Schuelke in a later post.)
Judge Sullivan blistered the Department of Justice for its work in the case, stating that “In 25 years on the bench, I’ve never seen anything approaching the mishandling and misconduct that I’ve seen in this case.”
The judge listed 10 specific instances of apparent missteps in the handling of evidence and witnesses by the trial prosecutors. (The best catalogue of the judge’s list is in the Anchorage Daily News, which has the most comprehensive coverage of the hearing.)
This selection of a special prosecutor by a trial judge to investigate charges of criminal contempt of court is extraordinary but explicitly allowed under Rule 42 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. As the New York Times pointed out, Schuelke will operate under the court’s authority and will gather evidence before recommending to the court whether to seek charges against six named prosecutors.
The six prosecutors under this newly announced probe include the five government lawyers who worked on the Ted Stevens trial: Public Integrity Section trial attorneys Nicholas Marsh and Edward Sullivan and Alaska-based Assistant U.S. Attorneys Joe Bottini and James Goeke. The other two lawyers under investigation are William Welch and Brenda Morris, who are the top two attorneys in the Public Integrity Section, which ran the investigation. Morris did double duty as the lead trial prosecutor as well as the Section's No. 2 lawyer.
The judge said “I have not pre-judged these attorneys for their culpability, and I hope the record will find no intentional obstruction of justice.”
Judge Sullivan's announcement yesterday means that there are two investigations of the Stevens trial prosecutors now—the one run for the last six months by the Department of Justice's Office of Public Responsibility (OPR) and the new one conducted by Schuelke. (The Anchorage Daily News also reported that the judge also stated that he would refer a complaint to federal prosecutors in Washington, D.C. that key prosecution witness Bill Allen's attorney signaled him to answer during Allen's testimony. Allen's attorney has denied the allegation.)
The judge’s blistering denunciation of Department of Justice failures in providing discovery the case of a federal detainee at Guantanamo Bay as well as that of the former 40-year U.S. Senator. The Associated Press reported that “During Tuesday’s hearing, Sullivan read a primer on criminal procedure, the kind of rudimentary lecture students normally receive during their first year of law school.” (Via Scott Horton’s blog in Harper’s magazine.)
Judge Sullivan’s denunciations and announcement of a special prosecutor to investigate prosecutors may affect a broader range of cases than just that of Ted Stevens. Politico.com reports, for example, that federal judges are increasingly “fed up” with what they see as prosecutorial misconduct and may be less likely in the future to accept representations of government attorneys in criminal cases.
Next: What was it like in the courtroom?
The trial judge dismissed the Ted Stevens case as expected, but went on to blast the trial prosecutors’ failures in turning over evidence and to order up his own criminal investigation into that failure.
By all reports, it was quite a hearing yesterday. I was thousands of miles away from that hearing, so what follows is mostly based on the reporting of the Anchorage Daily News, the New York Times, Politico.com, the Alaska Public Radio Network, National Public Radio, the Associated Press, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times.
Let’s take the announcement, the atmospherics, and the ramifications in order.
The Judge Drops Another Bomb on the Shellshocked Justice Department
U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan announced that he had asked a private attorney to investigate the failures of the trial prosecutors to turn over evidence to the defense as legally required. That attorney will be Henry “Hank” Schuelke, a former Assistant U.S. Attorney who served as a prosecutor and a judge in the Army. (More on Schuelke in a later post.)
Judge Sullivan blistered the Department of Justice for its work in the case, stating that “In 25 years on the bench, I’ve never seen anything approaching the mishandling and misconduct that I’ve seen in this case.”
The judge listed 10 specific instances of apparent missteps in the handling of evidence and witnesses by the trial prosecutors. (The best catalogue of the judge’s list is in the Anchorage Daily News, which has the most comprehensive coverage of the hearing.)
This selection of a special prosecutor by a trial judge to investigate charges of criminal contempt of court is extraordinary but explicitly allowed under Rule 42 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. As the New York Times pointed out, Schuelke will operate under the court’s authority and will gather evidence before recommending to the court whether to seek charges against six named prosecutors.
The six prosecutors under this newly announced probe include the five government lawyers who worked on the Ted Stevens trial: Public Integrity Section trial attorneys Nicholas Marsh and Edward Sullivan and Alaska-based Assistant U.S. Attorneys Joe Bottini and James Goeke. The other two lawyers under investigation are William Welch and Brenda Morris, who are the top two attorneys in the Public Integrity Section, which ran the investigation. Morris did double duty as the lead trial prosecutor as well as the Section's No. 2 lawyer.
The judge said “I have not pre-judged these attorneys for their culpability, and I hope the record will find no intentional obstruction of justice.”
Judge Sullivan's announcement yesterday means that there are two investigations of the Stevens trial prosecutors now—the one run for the last six months by the Department of Justice's Office of Public Responsibility (OPR) and the new one conducted by Schuelke. (The Anchorage Daily News also reported that the judge also stated that he would refer a complaint to federal prosecutors in Washington, D.C. that key prosecution witness Bill Allen's attorney signaled him to answer during Allen's testimony. Allen's attorney has denied the allegation.)
The judge’s blistering denunciation of Department of Justice failures in providing discovery the case of a federal detainee at Guantanamo Bay as well as that of the former 40-year U.S. Senator. The Associated Press reported that “During Tuesday’s hearing, Sullivan read a primer on criminal procedure, the kind of rudimentary lecture students normally receive during their first year of law school.” (Via Scott Horton’s blog in Harper’s magazine.)
Judge Sullivan’s denunciations and announcement of a special prosecutor to investigate prosecutors may affect a broader range of cases than just that of Ted Stevens. Politico.com reports, for example, that federal judges are increasingly “fed up” with what they see as prosecutorial misconduct and may be less likely in the future to accept representations of government attorneys in criminal cases.
Next: What was it like in the courtroom?
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
It Was Ted Stevens' Day
Anchorage—
Looking over the photographs of the smiling faces of Ted Stevens’ daughters surrounding him as he left court with the cloud of prosecution removed from him, I saw what a happy family looks like in public.
I was also struck by the legal work that helped free the former Senator. As I wrote on this blog back on October 5, Washingtonian magazine said in 2002 that Stevens' chief lawyer Brendan Sullivan’s counterattacks against the government “have put more prosecutors in jail than their indictments have put away his clients.”
Ted Stevens is of course not going to jail now, and his trial prosecutors have now got to lawyer up with a big legal cloud over their heads. And they can’t get Williams & Connolly to defend them, which had 13 lawyers in court to celebrate their victory today.
More tomorrow.
Looking over the photographs of the smiling faces of Ted Stevens’ daughters surrounding him as he left court with the cloud of prosecution removed from him, I saw what a happy family looks like in public.
I was also struck by the legal work that helped free the former Senator. As I wrote on this blog back on October 5, Washingtonian magazine said in 2002 that Stevens' chief lawyer Brendan Sullivan’s counterattacks against the government “have put more prosecutors in jail than their indictments have put away his clients.”
Ted Stevens is of course not going to jail now, and his trial prosecutors have now got to lawyer up with a big legal cloud over their heads. And they can’t get Williams & Connolly to defend them, which had 13 lawyers in court to celebrate their victory today.
More tomorrow.
Monday, April 6, 2009
I'll Be on the Radio Tomorrow (Tuesday)
Anchorage—
I’ll be on Alaska Public Radio Network’s call-in program “Talk of Alaska” from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. tomorrow (Tuesday) talking about the Ted Stevens case and the government’s abandonment of the prosecution. I was also interviewed this morning by CNN radio for a story that will apparently run on that radio network tomorrow morning.
I’ll be on Alaska Public Radio Network’s call-in program “Talk of Alaska” from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. tomorrow (Tuesday) talking about the Ted Stevens case and the government’s abandonment of the prosecution. I was also interviewed this morning by CNN radio for a story that will apparently run on that radio network tomorrow morning.
Really Final Linkorama of Reactions to Government's Abandonment of Ted Stevens Case
Anchorage—
Here’s the truly last roundup—I can’t help it if the editorialists take a while to get to commenting on the story:
New York Times editorial entitled “Mr. Holder and the Stevens case” (“Given the flagrant partisanship of the Bush Justice Department, it is especially reassuring to see Mr. Holder ignore party lines to do the right thing by Mr. Stevens.”) — www.nytimes.com at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/03/opinion/03fri3.html
Philadelphia Inquirer editorial entitled “Stevens Case[:] The right course” (“…Holder's decision doesn't necessarily discount the initial reasons for bringing charges….But the misconduct by federal prosecutors renders moot the question of whether Stevens was culpable - the heart of this case.”) – www.philly.com at http://www.philly.com/inquirer/opinion/20090403_Editorial__Stevens_Case.html
Anchorage Daily News editorial “Case dismissed[:] Stevens, Alaskans ill-served by prosecution's shoddy work” (“Ending the case against Ted Stevens was the right move, but that means Alaskans will never get an impartial evaluation of the charges against him.”) – www.adn.com at http://www.adn.com/opinion/view/story/747811.html
CQ staff, “Senators Relieved to See Stevens Case Dismissed” (“In essence, the Justice Department’s decision not to prosecute the case gave Stevens ‘a get-out-of-jail free card,’ [George Washington University law professor Jonathan] Turley said, adding that it was likely a jury would have convicted Stevens even without the evidence that defense attorneys have called into question.”) – www.cqpolitics.com at http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?parm1=5&docID=news-000003090161
Devlin Barrett (Associated Press Writer), “Justice Dept Under Microscope After Stevens Trial” (“The FBI has 2,500 pending corruption investigations across the country, and whether the targets are lawmakers or suspected crooked government inspectors, prosecutors may be more cautious in bringing charges after the Stevens debacle.”) -- http://www.koco.com/money/19094079/detail.html
Republican-oriented blogger suggests that concerns about bringing more attention to overzealous prosecutors led to Department of Justice’s abandonment of the case – Eric Florack, “Holder Voids Case Against Ted Stevens. But Why?” at http://bitsblog.florack.us/?p=18793
Blogger “with no reasonable doubt that Stevens was guilty of the crimes with which he was charged” agrees that prosecutorial errors made the Attorney General’s call the right one (“Because we have an adversarial system, lawyers on both sides treat the case as a game, stretching the spirit if not the letter of the law as necessary. Prosecutors, acting as agents of the state, are supposed to be more cognizant of justice — defense attorneys are supposed to get their guy off even if they’re sure he’s guilty, whereas prosecutors are expected to stop prosecuting if they find they’ve got the wrong guy — but it often doesn’t work out that way.”) – James Joyner, “Ted Stevens Conviction Voided,” in www.outsidethebeltway.com at http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/ted_stevens_conviction_voided_/
Well-known conservative blogger says that Attorney General bowed to the inevitable given the prosecutors’ apparent misconduct (“Of course, none of this changes the fact that Stevens had oil-company lobbyists remodeling his house and hid that fact from the Senate. The fact that prosecutors engaged in serious misconduct does not make Stevens clean. It just makes him free.”) – Ed Morrissey, “Ted Stevens off the hook for good,” in www.hotair.com at http://hotair.com/archives/2009/04/01/ted-stevens-off-the-hook-for-good/
Lawyer/blogger says “The really big decision here isn't just the dismissal of the indictment, but also the decision not to start the case over again with a new prosecution. In light of Stevens' age, and his exit from office in November, you can see why that makes sense. But it also means that the probable crime Stevens committed—and let's not forget, there was pretty good evidence that he accepted $250,000 in unreported gifts and renovations to his ski homes—goes into a small black hole of politician wrongdoing with no redress.” – Emily Bazelon, “Eric Holder’s Bold Move in the Ted Stevens Case,” www.slate.com at http://slate.msn.com/blogs/blogs/xxfactor/archive/2009/04/01/eric-holder-s-bold-move-in-the-ted-stevens-case.aspx
Conservative commentator and long-time Alaska journalist attacks the prosecution (“The federal government's unconstitutional and outrageous conduct has cost Stevens his reputation, his seat of 40 years in the United States Senate -- and immeasurable personal grief. Its true cost to Alaska -- in terms of leadership and effective representation in the Senate and a stolen election -- remains to be seen.”) – Paul Jenkins, “We deserve the truth behind the prosecution of Stevens,” www.adn.com at http://www.adn.com/opinion/comment/story/748602.html
Here’s the truly last roundup—I can’t help it if the editorialists take a while to get to commenting on the story:
New York Times editorial entitled “Mr. Holder and the Stevens case” (“Given the flagrant partisanship of the Bush Justice Department, it is especially reassuring to see Mr. Holder ignore party lines to do the right thing by Mr. Stevens.”) — www.nytimes.com at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/03/opinion/03fri3.html
Philadelphia Inquirer editorial entitled “Stevens Case[:] The right course” (“…Holder's decision doesn't necessarily discount the initial reasons for bringing charges….But the misconduct by federal prosecutors renders moot the question of whether Stevens was culpable - the heart of this case.”) – www.philly.com at http://www.philly.com/inquirer/opinion/20090403_Editorial__Stevens_Case.html
Anchorage Daily News editorial “Case dismissed[:] Stevens, Alaskans ill-served by prosecution's shoddy work” (“Ending the case against Ted Stevens was the right move, but that means Alaskans will never get an impartial evaluation of the charges against him.”) – www.adn.com at http://www.adn.com/opinion/view/story/747811.html
CQ staff, “Senators Relieved to See Stevens Case Dismissed” (“In essence, the Justice Department’s decision not to prosecute the case gave Stevens ‘a get-out-of-jail free card,’ [George Washington University law professor Jonathan] Turley said, adding that it was likely a jury would have convicted Stevens even without the evidence that defense attorneys have called into question.”) – www.cqpolitics.com at http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?parm1=5&docID=news-000003090161
Devlin Barrett (Associated Press Writer), “Justice Dept Under Microscope After Stevens Trial” (“The FBI has 2,500 pending corruption investigations across the country, and whether the targets are lawmakers or suspected crooked government inspectors, prosecutors may be more cautious in bringing charges after the Stevens debacle.”) -- http://www.koco.com/money/19094079/detail.html
Republican-oriented blogger suggests that concerns about bringing more attention to overzealous prosecutors led to Department of Justice’s abandonment of the case – Eric Florack, “Holder Voids Case Against Ted Stevens. But Why?” at http://bitsblog.florack.us/?p=18793
Blogger “with no reasonable doubt that Stevens was guilty of the crimes with which he was charged” agrees that prosecutorial errors made the Attorney General’s call the right one (“Because we have an adversarial system, lawyers on both sides treat the case as a game, stretching the spirit if not the letter of the law as necessary. Prosecutors, acting as agents of the state, are supposed to be more cognizant of justice — defense attorneys are supposed to get their guy off even if they’re sure he’s guilty, whereas prosecutors are expected to stop prosecuting if they find they’ve got the wrong guy — but it often doesn’t work out that way.”) – James Joyner, “Ted Stevens Conviction Voided,” in www.outsidethebeltway.com at http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/ted_stevens_conviction_voided_/
Well-known conservative blogger says that Attorney General bowed to the inevitable given the prosecutors’ apparent misconduct (“Of course, none of this changes the fact that Stevens had oil-company lobbyists remodeling his house and hid that fact from the Senate. The fact that prosecutors engaged in serious misconduct does not make Stevens clean. It just makes him free.”) – Ed Morrissey, “Ted Stevens off the hook for good,” in www.hotair.com at http://hotair.com/archives/2009/04/01/ted-stevens-off-the-hook-for-good/
Lawyer/blogger says “The really big decision here isn't just the dismissal of the indictment, but also the decision not to start the case over again with a new prosecution. In light of Stevens' age, and his exit from office in November, you can see why that makes sense. But it also means that the probable crime Stevens committed—and let's not forget, there was pretty good evidence that he accepted $250,000 in unreported gifts and renovations to his ski homes—goes into a small black hole of politician wrongdoing with no redress.” – Emily Bazelon, “Eric Holder’s Bold Move in the Ted Stevens Case,” www.slate.com at http://slate.msn.com/blogs/blogs/xxfactor/archive/2009/04/01/eric-holder-s-bold-move-in-the-ted-stevens-case.aspx
Conservative commentator and long-time Alaska journalist attacks the prosecution (“The federal government's unconstitutional and outrageous conduct has cost Stevens his reputation, his seat of 40 years in the United States Senate -- and immeasurable personal grief. Its true cost to Alaska -- in terms of leadership and effective representation in the Senate and a stolen election -- remains to be seen.”) – Paul Jenkins, “We deserve the truth behind the prosecution of Stevens,” www.adn.com at http://www.adn.com/opinion/comment/story/748602.html
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