When the Rove Republican Racket went after political operatives and other alleged "criminals" though the U.S. Department of Justice, it appears they used hardball tactics.
Two popular hardball tactics during the Bush Administration were 1.) the forced waiver of the attorney-client privilege and the other was 2.) the objection to corporate payment of attorney fees.
Can you imagine that innocent people could not talk with their attorneys in confidence? Can you imagine innocent political operatives forced to pay for their legal fees without the help of their political party or business?
Under these hardball rules, Jim Tobin of Maine would have been forced to pay his multi-million-dollar legal fees on his own, leading to his own bankruptcy and leaving his family in ruins.
According to former Chief Assitant U.S. Attorney of the Eastern District of New York, Paul H. Schoeman, "There has been a steady retreat from those practices resulting about a year ago in a revised set of policies that are now part of the U.S. Attorney's Manual and basically reflect that, in all but extraordinary circumstances, the DOJ will not seek waiver of attorney client privilege and will not hold the failure to waive or the payment of individual defendants' legal expenses against corporations that are trying to cooperate."
Thank Goodness!
