U.S. Attorneys Had Glowing Reviews Of Performance

       From New York Times we get a little more info on the firing of U.S. attorneys over the past few weeks.

   As you know, the Justice Department has said the the firings were due to poor job performance which has turned out to not be true.

    All eight prosecutors are Republicans who were appointed by Bush during his first term as president.  

                                                                        

New York Times

By DAVID JOHNSTON

Published: February 25, 2007

WASHINGTON, Feb. 24 — Internal Justice Department performance reports for six of the eight United States attorneys who have been dismissed in recent months rated them “well regarded,” “capable” or “very competent,” a review of the evaluations shows.

The reviews, each of them 6 to 12 pages long, were carried out by Justice Department officials from 2003 to 2006. Each report was based on extensive interviews, conducted over several days with judges, other federal law enforcement agencies and staff members in each office.

On Saturday, Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, who has led a Congressional investigation into the dismissals and has been briefed on the evaluations, said the reports showed that new legislation was needed to keep the Justice Department from politically motivated firings.

“As we feared, the comprehensive evaluations show these U.S. attorneys did not deserve to be fired,” Mr. Schumer said. “To the contrary, they reveal they were effective, respected and set appropriate priorities.”

The official ( Justice department ), speaking on condition of anonymity because of the confidential nature of personnel information, said, “The reviews don’t take into account whether the U.S. attorneys carried out departmental priorities.”

In recent days, several of the prosecutors have described conflicts with the Justice Department over death penalty cases and pending political corruption investigations as a possible factor in their firings. Justice Department officials have denied such issues were a factor.

   Political corruption investigations will get you kicked out the door real fast if you happen to be investigating someone close to certain administrations who may have much info on that administrations activities.

 

Technorati tags: U.S.Attoneys, Senator Schumer, Justice Department, Political corruption