ePluribus Media's on-going series on US Attorneys will bring background stories on many US Attorneys ... we started with US Attorneys: Kevin Ryan, Carol Lam, Paul Charlton, HE Cummins, David Iglesias, John McKay and Daniel Bogden. With the exception of Bud Cummins, these attorneys were all "resigned" on December 7, 2006.
Recently, an eighth name was added to the list of the Gonzales Seven, the U.S. Attorneys forced to resign since the reauthorization of the Patriot Act in March of 2006. It now appears Margaret Chiara can also be added to the list of attorneys receiving their phone calls on December 7th, 2006 -- Pearl Harbor Day. In his opening remarks to the House committee hearings, Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General William Moschella stated that there are 18 who have resigned since March 2006.
The U.S. Attorney story to date:
On Tuesday March 6th, 2007, under oath in front of Congress, six recently fired US Attorneys gave testimony compelled by subpoenas issued on Friday, March 2nd. H.E. "Bud" Cummins, Paul Charlton, Daniel Bogden, David Iglesias, Carol Lam and John McKay testified in front of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law, with Lam, McKay, Iglesias and Cummins also testifying in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier the same day.
[Update: (New York Times) In a private meeting on Capital Hill, Alberto Gonzales said the Justice Department would not block attempts to change the current rules on replacing US Attorneys.]
Part I of this series traces how the lack of adequate insurance coverage impacted families already suffering the deaths or uncertainty surrounding the status of their family members serving in Iraq or Afghanistan as civilian contractors.
Kirk von Ackermann is missing.
So is his fellow worker, Ryan Manelick.
Although both men, contractors in the Irag theater, have been declared dead, they are both missing from the official statistics of the injured or deceased maintained by the Department of Labor.
On January 16th 2007, Kevin Ryan, US Attorney for California's Northern District, announced his resignation. Mr. Ryan, who had served Northern California for the last 4 1/2 years, is one of the victims of the "Pearl Harbor Day Massacre" of US Attorneys (6-7 were asked to step down on December 7th 2006).
Ironically, of the seven US Attorneys purged by Alberto Gonzales last December, David C. Iglesias of New Mexico, who has received little attention in the press, is perhaps the most famous of the group...but most people just don't know it.
While a Navy JAG officer in 1986 he was the defense counsel in a Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, court-martial of two men accused of assaulting a fellow Marine. Iglesias, and his defense in that case, later became the inspiration for the movie, "A Few Good Men."
Nominated for the position of US Attorney by George W. Bush in August of 2001 and approved by the US Senate in October, Iglesias became the first Hispanic to serve as U.S. attorney since the Nixon administration.
He announced his "forced resignation" on December 19, 2006.
The saga of the purge of US Attorneys continues to unfold and this "spotlight" features the resignation of US Attorney John McKay of Washington's Western District, and his "interim" replacement, Jeffrey Sullivan. Mc Kay was nominated by President Bush and approved by the Senate in 2001 and has served the citizens of Western Washington for the last five years.
Typically, US Attorneys change with a change in the White House, not in the middle of a presidential term. McKay was asked to resign on December 7th, 2006 and announced his resignation effective January 26th, 2007. "I have nothing but respect and pride in having worked for President Bush," he said. He will be joining the faculty of Seattle University Law School.
So why was McKay asked to resign?
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