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Contractor's Cooperation Continues in Duke Cunningham Case    [

    Feinstein: Lam Fired Over Cunningham Prosecution
    The Associated Press

    Wednesday 14 March 2007

    Washington - Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Wednesday she believes the ouster of San Diego U.S. Attorney Carol Lam was connected to Lam's prosecution of former Republican congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham, even though the Bush administration has denied it.

    "In my heart of hearts I do, no matter what they say," Feinstein, D-Calif., a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in an interview with The Associated Press.

    "The fact is there are additional investigations that have come from that. The fact is that the day before she left office she filed two additional indictments," Feinstein said, referring to charges Lam filed last month against an ex-CIA official and a defense contractor tied to Cunningham.

    "Now they weren't of members of Congress," Feinstein added. "But whether this has had a chilling effect over that investigation I don't know. But I'm concerned about it."

    Feinstein's comments came amid a growing furor over the firing last year of eight U.S. attorneys in a Justice Department purge. Critics contend the dismissals were politically motivated and President Bush said Wednesday he is troubled by the Justice Department's misleading explanations to Congress on the situation.

    Attorney General Alberto Gonzales defended himself on talk shows Wednesday morning. "I would never retaliate, nor would I ever expect a decision with respect to the removal of a United States attorney that would interfere with an ongoing investigation," he said on ABC's "Good Morning America."

    A number of leading Senate Democrats including Majority Leader Harry Reid have called for Gonzales to resign, but California's senior senator said she is not ready to go that far. She said she thought it was appropriate to "get all the facts before you make decisions, and I don't think we're quite there yet."

    E-mails released Tuesday show that long before Lam drew public attention for the Cunningham case she was being noticed by political advisers at the Justice Department - and shortlisted for termination.

    In the e-mails, which date back more than two years, Justice Department chief of staff Kyle Sampson recommended to White House counsel Harriet Miers that Lam be removed, striking her name along with those of at least three other U.S. attorneys he considered "ineffectual managers and prosecutors" who "chafed against Administration initiatives."

    Sampson, who resigned Monday, did not specify what initiatives he was referring to.

    Lam, who is now working as a lawyer for San Diego-based wireless technology company Qualcomm Inc., declined to comment Tuesday. In testimony March 7 before the Senate Judiciary Committee, she said she had never been told the reason she was told to resign last December.

    Lam's office began investigating Cunningham and his associates on bribery allegations in July 2005. Cunningham pleaded guilty and was sentenced in March 2006 to more than eight years in federal prison for taking more than $2.4 million in bribes from defense contractors.

    Last month, actually two days before Lam left her post, her office obtained indictments of one of the defense contractors and a former top CIA official accused of fraud in the expanding corruption investigation.

    Lam, who was appointed in 2002, also tightened prosecution guidelines at the border during her tenure, raising the violation requirements in an effort to manage the flood of immigration cases referred to her office.

    Later e-mails between Sampson and Bill Mercer, the associate attorney general, indicated concern over the drop in border prosecutions in San Diego.

    "Has ODAG (Office of the Deputy Attorney General) ever called Carol Lam and woodshedded her re immigration enforcement? Has anyone?" Sampson wrote Mercer in May 2006.

    White House adviser Karl Rove has said Lam was removed for failing to file immigration cases. William Moschella, an associate deputy attorney general, has said she was let go because her prosecution of gun crimes and immigration violations "just didn't stack up."

    Feinstein wrote to Gonzales last June questioning border prosecution guidelines in Lam's district, but received a reply from Moschella in which he described Lam's immigration smuggling caseload as rising "favorably" in 2006.

 

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    Contractor's Cooperation Continues in Duke Cunningham Case
    The Associated Press

    Monday 12 March 2007

    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.

    Urbina agreed to delay sentencing and set another status hearing for Sept. 10.

    Wade, who pleaded guilty a year ago t' plying Cunningham with a yacht, cash and other gifts in exchange for Defense Department contracts, was not present in court. His attorney, Howard Shapiro, declined comment after the hearing, as did Sklamberg.

    Cunningham, of suburban San Diego, pleaded guilty in November 2005 to taking $2.4 million in bribes from defense contractors and was sentenced to more than eight years in prison.

    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.