Law.com adds to the controversy surrounding the dismissal of several US District Attorneys including BALCO AD Kevin Ryan. Emails between the DAs and the Bush Justice Dept reveal troubles in the halls of power.
By the time he was fired late last year, former San Francisco U.S. Attorney Kevin Ryan's stock seemed to have dropped so low among Justice Department officials that even routine communications were met with dismissiveness and sarcasm.
Seems Washington protested the sentencing recommendations Ryan put forth for Victor Conte and his BALCO buddies. It even got profane.
As early as last March, e-mails show, Justice Department officials were annoyed with Ryan for issuing a press release that crowed about the U.S. Sentencing Commission's new guidelines for steroid offenses -- a pet issue of Ryan's, since he prosecuted the BALCO steroids case.
"After our conversations, I am fairly surprised that you would not consult with me or anyone else in Main Justice before issuing a press release on something that has nothing to do with your office," wrote Michael Elston, an official in the Office of the Deputy Attorney General.
When Elston forwarded the message, a longtime DOJ administrator gave a short response.
"UFB!" wrote David Margolis, presumably a common off-color shorthand for "unbelievable."
Ryan and the DA attempted to cash in political ships to no avail in the 'troubled San Francisco office.
A trove of internal Justice Department e-mails released over the past week by a congressional committee show that Ryan was the final prosecutor added to the list of eight whose firings have become the first big Washington scandal this year.
Not even attempts to cash in political debts were able save his job.
While the other seven prosecutors had received favorable performance reviews, Ryan was already on notice by fall that his management style was a problem.
In a separate e-mail, Margolis said he got a call from a federal judge -- San Francisco-based Marilyn Hall Patel -- who was trying to get Ryan's performance reviews. According to later e-mails, it was a reluctance to fight over releasing the reviews that spurred the department to finally fire Ryan.
The battle between Ryan's office and the Justice Dept continued, back and forth:
"During his tenure, the office has become the most fractured office in the nation, morale has fallen to the point that it is harming our prosecutorial efforts, and the USA has lost the confidence of many of the career prosecutors who are leaving the office," says one Justice Department document, apparently prepared for congressional hearings on the firings.
Another e-mail string circulated a story that ran last year in the SF Weekly about Ryan's management issues.
So it was with some apparent dismay that on Dec. 10, after Ryan was notified of his firing, top presidential adviser Karl Rove started hearing complaints.
In an e-mail to Kyle Sampson, the deputy to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales who resigned as a result of the U.S. Attorney controversy, Rove aide William Kelley complained that "Ryan is the only one so far calling in political chits (which is reason enough to justify the decision, in my view), but Karl would like to know some particulars as he fields these calls."
One of those calls apparently came from Gerald Parsky, the Los Angeles-based Republican power broker who heads up a committee that vets federal appointments -- including Ryan's eventual successor -- in California.
"FYI," Kelley wrote to Sampson earlier on Dec. 7, "Jerry Parsky has put in an outraged call protesting the fact of Ryan's departure," and also how the message was delivered.
"And he's having lunch with the president next week," Kelley added.
Those connections didn't save Ryan's job, or even buy him extra time.
As FT.com reports, the controversy (?scandal) now reaches into the White House with Karl Rove and US AG Alberto Gonzales implicated.
The president was responding to Democratic anger over his refusal to accede to their request that Karl Rove, his senior strategist, and Harriet Miers, the former White House counsel, testify over the controversial sacking of the top prosecutors late last year.
The White House launched a counter-offensive argument on behalf of Alberto Gonzales, the attorney-general who is facing calls for his resignation over his handling of the crisis.
Comments