Interim DC US Atty., Fmr. Gonzo Aid, May Rule on Subpoenas

Assaying reader comments in our fair corner of blogosphere, as you all know, can result not infrequently in the discovery of a nugget.  Sometimes the nuggets are offered up professionally, but also in passing, and lead one to pan down a bit further in the sand.

So, last night, I was loitering over at Digby's, where a commenter made the following observation

Leahy can issue subpoenas on his own but he can't enforce them on his own. It takes a majority vote of the Senate to hold a person in contempt for refusing to obey a subpoena. (BY the way, the matter is then refered to a US Attorney - ie a Justice Dept employee - for prosecution.)
[snip]
bloix | 03.19.07 - 5:24 pm |

So, I says to myself, I says, "A US attorney prosecutes Congressional subpoenas?  Ah'll be damned.  Who is the US attorney for the District of Columbia?"

Aide to Attorney General Is Interim U.S. Attorney
By Carol D. Leonnig
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, September 23, 2006; Page B05

The Justice Department yesterday appointed Jeffrey A. Taylor, the counselor to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, to be U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia.

Taylor succeeds Kenneth L. Wainstein in running the largest U.S. attorney's office in the country. For now, Taylor will be interim U.S. attorney; President Bush can nominate him to take the job, subject to Senate confirmation.

Wainstein was confirmed by the Senate on Thursday to a new post in the Justice Department, assistant attorney general for national security, after his nomination had been held up for months by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.). Levin had been seeking FBI documents relating to its agents' concerns about mistreatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay while Wainstein was a top aide to FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III.

Hmmm.  The Attorney General's counselor was appointed -- not nominated, appointed -- DC US attorney six weeks before Democrats gained subpoena power??

Who is this guy? I asked Nexis, and discovered a curious career arc...

The San Diego Union-Tribune
April 18, 2002, Thursday
HEADLINE: U.S. attorney race loses a candidate but gains another; Jeffrey Taylor takes job in D.C.; DA aide is most recent entry
BYLINE: Marisa Taylor; STAFF WRITER

A federal prosecutor once described by some Washington insiders as a leading candidate for the U.S. attorney post in San Diego has decided not to pursue the job.

Instead, Jeffrey Taylor, an assistant U.S. attorney in San Diego, has accepted work as one of three legal counselors to U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft.

[snip]

Taylor, 37, said he withdrew from the process because he wanted to work in Ashcroft's office, not because of any disenchantment with the drawn-out selection process.

[snip]

A Republican screening committee originally submitted several names to the White House, including that of former acting U.S. Attorney Charles La Bella. The committee also recommended Carol Lam, a Superior Court judge; Robert Brewer Jr., a former Los Angeles federal prosecutor; and Yvonne Dutton, a Los Angeles attorney.

Taylor's name was not forwarded by the committee.

Sources said White House aides intervened at that point because they favored Taylor, who was then working in Washington as counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee....

Three weeks later, Carol Lam was nominated by the White House.

Taylor must have made a positive impression on Alberto Gonzales at Justice when Gonzales replaced Ashcroft, because he stayed on as his counselor.

But it appears Gonzales saw more pressing work for Taylor to do:

The San Diego Union-Tribune
October 16, 2006 Monday
SECTION: LOCAL; Pg. B-2
HEADLINE: U.S. attorney job in D.C. goes to ex-S.D. prosecutor
BYLINE: Onell R. Soto, STAFF WRITER

[snip]

He (Taylor) said he looks forward to settling into his new job, which he started two weeks ago.

"Here, you're much closer to the casework," he said.

That includes supervising political cases, including the corruption scandal involving lobbyist Jack Abramoff, in which Rep. Bob Ney, R-Ohio, pleaded guilty Friday.

His office is also prosecuting Mitchell Wade, who admitted bribing Randy "Duke" Cunningham, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy and tax evasion charges in San Diego last year and resigned from Congress..

Wade's sentencing and cooperation in the Kyle Foggo and Brent Wilkes trial hangs in the balance with Taylor's office, under assistant US attorney Howard Sklamberg.  

San Francisco Examiner
Contractor's cooperation continues in Duke Cunningham Case
Mar 12, 2007
AP

WASHINGTON - A defense contractor who pleaded guilty to bribing former GOP Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham continues to cooperate and may be a trial witness against another contractor and an ex-CIA official who were indicted last month, a federal prosecutor said Monday.

Mitchell Wade "is cooperating in a number of matters" and "may well be a trial witness" in the case against the CIA's former No. 3 official, Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, and contractor Brent Wilkes, the prosecutor said in federal court.

Federal prosecutor Howard Sklamberg gave the update to U.S. District Judge Ricardo Urbina at a status hearing in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Circuit.

[snip] Foggo, executive director of the CIA until he resigned in May, was accused last month of accepting vacations and other gifts from Wilkes, who in return got inside information that helped him win agency contracts. Wilkes also was accused of funneling bribes to Cunningham. Foggo and Wilkes face 11 counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering. They have pleaded not guilty and are free on bail.

The case is being prosecuted by the U.S. attorney's office in San Diego and no trial date has been set.

So, not only is Lam canned in San Diego, but Gonzales appoints his former counselor to manage MZM founder Mitchell Wade's potential testimony against Kyle Foggo and Brent Wilkes in the CIA contracting scandal, as well as tie up the Abramaoff case.  All within a matter of a couple of months.

Now, back to the subpoena prosecuting, here's a backgrounder from the New York Law Journal on the DC USA's role in the congressional subpoena process:

A congressional subpoena will identify the name of the issuing committee or subcommittee, the date, time and place of the hearing the witness is to attend, and the documents sought to be produced.  The subpoena may further specify the date and place
the documents are to be delivered. Congressional subpoenas are generally served by a U.S. Marshall or committee staff.

When properly served, the witness has a duty to appear and testify and produce the requested documents or present a valid reason for not doing so. The subpoena itself may be defective if it seeks information beyond the committee’s jurisdiction, or it seeks information beyond the scope of the resolution authorizing the particular investigation,
or it may be too vague in its request for documents, or it may be unreasonably burdensome.

Congress can enforce its investigative processes through three different contempt proceedings. The House and the Senate may cite a witness for contempt under their inherent contempt power, or they may invoke a statutory criminal contempt procedure. The Senate also has a separate civil contempt procedure available to enforce Senate subpoenas.

[snip]

A contempt citation must be approved by the subcommittee, if there is one, and by the full committee, and by the full House or Senate or by the presiding officer if the Congress is not in session.

Once a citation has been certified by “the President of the Senate or the Speaker of the House,” it is referred to the appropriate U.S. attorney, “whose duty it shall be to bring the matter before the grand jury for its action.”

So, to summarize, Attorney General Abu Gonzales appointed his own counselor from the Justice Department to be the US Attorney for the District of Columbia, while the White House and the Justice Department were readying the firing of Carol Lam and seven other US attorneys.

Among the cases Jeffrey Taylor, Gonzales's counselor, assumed were the bribery sentencing of defense contractor Mitchell Wade, the management of Wade's testimony in the contracting fraud cases against Kyle Foggo and Brent Wilkes, and unresolved issues surrounding the Abramaoff case.

Assuming Attorney Taylor were acting impartially and without White House political pressure, he would be sailing through tremendous institutional head winds (just as Fitzgerald did).  But given the evolution of the USA firings and Taylor's resume as Gonzales's counselor at Justice, is he not now a hair's breadth away from needing to recuse himself both from the Foggo/Wilkes/Wade proceedings, as well as any potential subpoena enforcement coming down from Congress?

We're sure to see Taylor's name in the news soon.  IANAL, so I look forward to input from all you eagles out there.