SOUTHFIELD, Mich.-
Prominent trial lawyer and former gubernatorial candidate Geoffrey Fieger is asking the heads of the U.S. Senate and House Judiciary committees to investigate the Justice Department’s probe of gifts by his aides to John Edwards’ 2004 presidential campaign.
Fieger said Thursday that the case is an outgrowth of the politicization of the Justice Department under Attorney General Alberto Gonzales that he said led to the recent firings of eight U.S. attorneys. The congressional committees are investigating those firings.
“The real story in this unfortunate scandal is not the eight prosecutors who refused to respond to political pressure, but rather, those unidentified federal prosecutors who have caved in to White House political pressure and who have abused justice … for political ends,” Fieger said in a statement forwarded to the lawmakers.
Fieger accused Detroit U.S. Attorney Stephen Murphy of “engaging in numerous political prosecutions of Democrats,” including former Macomb County Prosecutor Carl Marlinga, former Wayne County Executive Edward McNamara and Fieger himself.
Fieger, who once defended assisted-suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian, was the losing Democratic gubernatorial candidate to Republican Michigan Gov. John Engler in 1998.
Fieger sent the request to Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., as well as Sens. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., Carl Levin, D-Mich., Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.
The U.S. attorney’s office in Detroit released a statement Thursday afternoon saying it could not comment “on matters that may or may not be under investigation.”
However, it continued: “The Department of Justice and the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Michigan do not make decisions about investigations or prosecutions for political reasons. … The claims that Mr. Fieger has made to the media are either gross distortions, outright falsifications, or irresponsible allegations.”
Federal prosecutors say they are investigating whether Fieger’s firm used employees as conduits to make multiple contributions to the Edwards campaign and then reimbursed them. Agents seized records during a Nov. 30, 2005, raid on Fieger’s Southfield offices.
More than 100 federal agents participated in that raid and simultaneous raids on the homes of his associates, Fieger said. He said agents are continuing to harass his associates.
Fieger sued Gonzales over the case in January, saying the attorney general improperly failed to obtain Federal Election Commission approval before starting a criminal case.
Fieger associates Jon Marcus in Arizona, Barry Bialek in Colorado and Jack Beam in Illinois filed similar suits this year.
Two Fieger associates in Michigan have sued prosecutors, saying they used illegal tactics against them in the case.
On Tuesday, Fieger aide Terrance Baulch sued three federal prosecutors in U.S. District Court in Detroit, saying that they improperly withheld documents from him as they pressed him to cooperate with the investigation.
The defendants are assistant U.S. attorneys Lynn A. Helland and Christopher L. Varner and Justice Department lawyer M. Kendall Day.
Baulch said prosecutors forced his lawyer, John Minock, to refuse to let Baulch take a copy of a report of investigators’ conversations with Baulch and other witnesses.
On Wednesday, another Fieger aide, Stephen Hnat, amended his Feb. 27 lawsuit against the three federal prosecutors. Hnat made a $2,000 contribution to the Edwards campaign in January 2004. A hearing is set for April 12.
Hnat said prosecutors also sought to deny him a copy of the investigative report in the case against him.
The statement from Murphy’s office said the government soon would ask the court to throw out each of the “frivolous” lawsuits filed by Fieger and his associates.
