Justice Department Intervenes In Tobacco Company Investigation

From American Progress

ETHICS -- BUSH LOYALISTS INTERFERED IN GOVERNMENT'S TOBACCO COMPANY INVESTIGATION: "The leader of the Justice Department team that prosecuted a landmark lawsuit against tobacco companies said yesterday that Bush administration political appointees repeatedly ordered her to take steps that weakened the government's racketeering case." Sharon Y. Eubanks, who served for 22 years as a Justice Department lawyer, was in the middle of a government investigation claiming that the tobacco industry had conspired to lie to smokers when "Bush loyalists in Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales's office began micromanaging the team's strategy in the final weeks of the 2005 trial. ... She said a supervisor demanded that she and her trial team drop recommendations that tobacco executives be removed from their corporate positions as a possible penalty." Eubanks said top Justice officials largely ignored the case until it became clear that the government might win against the tobacco companies, recalling that she received an "angry phone call" about the case from Kevin McCallum, the then-Associate Attorney General. Eubanks's supervisors instructed her to tell key witnesses to alter testimony and "read verbatim a closing argument [the Attorney General's office] had written for her." Eubanks said she is revealing the interference now because of the recent revelations about the administration's prosecutor purge. "Political interference is happening at Justice across the department," she said. "When decisions are made now in the Bush attorney general's office, politics is the primary consideration...The rule of law goes out the window."

 

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