Sen. Stevens ‘got screwed’ by Justice

1 Apr 2009 // The Justice Department’s stunning decision to drop all charges against former Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) had GOP senators hailing the news as a vindication while government watchdogs fretted over the impact on other corruption cases against public officials.

“I’m overjoyed,” crowed Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who noted that he had shared the good news with Stevens in a phone call Wednesday. “Here’s a guy who gave over 60 years of service to his country and he got screwed — screwed by our own Justice Department.“

Hatch, a senior Republican and previous chairman of the Judiciary Committee, praised Attorney General Eric Holder for taking the action, but bemoaned the handling of a prosecution that has “besmirched” Stevens’s reputation irreparably.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) charged that the Justice Department “ruined” her former colleague’s political career.

“I am pleased with the news that the Justice Department will drop all charges against Sen. Ted Stevens, but I am deeply disturbed that the government can ruin a man’s career and then say, ‘Never mind,’ ” Murkowski said.

Stevens, the longest-serving Republican in Senate history, was convicted last fall of lying on Senate disclosure forms, the verdict coming just eight days before he lost his reelection bid against Democrat Mark Begich. The Begich-Stevens contest was tight, and the government’s prosecution of Stevens almost certainly played a role in the outcome.

Five months later, and after a thorough review of a series of allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, the Justice Department will drop the seven felony ethics charges and said there would be no new trial in the case.

Stevens was accused of concealing an estimated $250,000 worth of goods and services — the majority of which was devoted to house renovations — he received from Bill Allen, a longtime friend and executive at an Alaskan oil-services company.

In their court filing Wednesday, Justice lawyers said they found that prosecutors had concealed from Stevens’s defense team notes from an interview with Allen, in which Allen maintained that the work on

Stevens’s home was worth only $80,000, an amount that conflicted with testimony Allen gave during the trial.

Holder, in a statement, said it was in the “interest of justice” to drop the charges because “certain information” should have been provided to Stevens’s defense team.

Stevens was appealing the conviction, but Holder’s decision means the case will now be dropped.

The court ordered Stevens to appear at a pro-forma hearing April 7. At that time, the judge will take up the government’s motion to dismiss the indictment and Stevens’s attorney will reply in open court.

Brendan Sullivan, who represented Stevens during the trial, told reporters that he was “very grateful” to Holder for throwing the case out because of “extraordinary evidence” of misconduct from prosecutors “hell-bent” on convicting a senator.

Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), who worked closely with Stevens on the Appropriations Committee for decades, said he was heartened by Holder’s decision even though Stevens, 85, will never be able to get his reputation back or escape a mountain of legal bills.

“I didn’t tell him this, but, you know, he’s really suffered,” Inouye said in an interview. “I don’t want to use the word ‘angry,’ but I’m just disappointed that prosecutors were involved in that type of misbehavior.”

Inouye also asserted that Stevens would have won reelection if it weren’t for the high-profile prosecution.

“Lawyers’ fees are not cheap,” he continued. “He’ll have to work the rest of his life.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) stopped short of calling the decision a vindication of Stevens.

“What happened is that Holder decided that he’d been punished enough,” Reid said. “He’s 85 years old. He’s lost his seat. There’s no reason to waste taxpayer money on another trial.”

But Republicans blamed the Justice Department for ending Stevens’s career unjustly.

“I think there should be a thorough investigation and anybody within sight of the misconduct should be prosecuted to the hilt,” said Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.).

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), a constant critic of the Justice Department under former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and the Bush administration, hailed Holder’s decision, calling it solid proof that “there’s a new sheriff in town.”

“I think it just demonstrates that Eric Holder is a different attorney general who follows the rule of law for everybody and will not tolerate prosecutorial misconduct,” he said.

Even Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a longtime foe and frequent critic of Stevens’s earmarks, managed a terse congratulations.

“I’m sure Sen. Stevens and his family are very relieved” is all McCain would say on the topic.

But congressional watchdogs expressed deep alarm about the Justice Department misconduct and its implications for current and future cases against lawmakers and public officials.

Gerald Hebert, the executive director of the Campaign Legal Center and former Justice Department official, said he understood why Holder would take action in the matter, but he was puzzled by the added decision against granting a new trial.

Hebert said Wednesday’s DoJ filing did not lay out legal reasons for why the government is not seeking a new trial, which could have included Stevens’s age or the high costs of prosecuting the case again.

“What troubles me most is what does this whole matter say about what the DoJ is doing to rid the nation of public corruption in other pending cases?” he said. “It would be nice if there would be some assurances that public corruption cases are being handled properly.”

Hebert is concerned that there have been no recent convictions in the wide-ranging prosecution of former lobbyist Jack Abramoff, his associates and lawmakers close to him.

“We haven’t seen any action against [former Rep.] John Doolittle [R-Calif.] or [former Rep.] Tom DeLay [R-Texas],” Hebert said.

Melanie Sloan, the executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, called the misconduct a public-relations disaster because politicians can seize on a decision to drop the charges to try to prove that government prosecutors are going after them “willy-nilly.”

She said DoJ lawyers in the public integrity section handling the case should have been meticulous because Sullivan, Stevens’s lawyer, has a reputation of claiming prosecutorial misconduct very quickly in his cases.

Furthermore, she stressed, Holder’s decision in no way should be viewed as a vindication of Stevens but rather as an indictment of the Justice Department’s inability to do one of its most important jobs. The Justice Department has had several problems dealing with separation-of-powers issues when it comes to investigating and prosecuting lawmakers, such as the raid on former Reps. William Jefferson’s (D-La.) offices and the wiretaps on Rep. Rick Renzi’s (R-Ariz.) phone.

“It was careless, sloppy and just inexcusable,” Sloan said of the misconduct in the Stevens case.

J. Taylor Rushing, Jeffrey Young and Jim Snyder contributed to this article.