The Sad Truth

In 2003, a horrific fire broke out in Rhode Island during a rock concert of the group Great White (pictured) killing 100 people, many of them young.

Dave Kane, whose 18 year-old son died in the fire, met today with the new U.S. Attorney in Rhode Island seeking justice. According to the Associated Press. "Kane and other families have complained in the past that the investigation into the fire, spearheaded by state authorities, had been tainted by corruption and ineptitude"

The story goes on to say:

However, Andrew Horwitz, a professor at Roger Williams University School of Law in Bristol, who has followed the case closely, said he thought it was unlikely that federal authorities would investigate. The federal government typically only prosecutes criminal activity that crosses state borders, and Horwitz said it would be a stretch to find a federal issue in this case. He said he has seen no convincing evidence of a cover-up, and prosecutors can't go after investigators simply for doing a bad job. "Lots of people do their jobs poorly. Lots of people make mistakes," he said. "We don't tend to criminalize that."

Horowitz hits on a judicial truth: we don't criminalize people who do their jobs poorly.

Unfortunately, during the Rove Republican Racket stay in power the sad truth was Karl Rove's Justice Department went to great lengths to prosecute the innocent or people who may have done their jobs poorly.

Just ask Sue Schmitz or Governor Doyle's aide.

Rove's Goal: Staying in Power

Wayne Slater, political columnist of the Dallas Morning News, (pictured) writes an interesting analysis of Karl Rove based on the book by Matt Latimer.

Slater writes, "There is a view that Rove's politics were never about advancing conservatism, but staying in power. He was about winning – every dispute, every point, every difference, even if it meant dividing your own team."

With the take-over of the U.S. Department of Justice in 2006, Rove was able to gain political power by using criminal charges to go after political operatives in Alaska, Wisconsin, Alabama, California, Mississippi, Maine, and elsewhere.

Using the DOJ for political purposes was not a conservative position. It was shamefully about staying in power.

Read the entire analysis here.

Federal Judge Refuses Criminal Cases

The Rove Republican Racket, which primarily targeted Democrats, successfully prosecuted state and local political leaders using federal statutes.

The federalization and creation of new political crimes to politically prosecute prominent Democrats has been an absolute disgrace and a page taken out of George Orwell's novel 1984.

Now, with the scary federalization of petty street crime, a federal judge in Milwaukee, J.P. Stadtmueller (pictured), is refusing to take any more criminal cases.

According to a report today on NPR:

A federal judge in Milwaukee has taken the unusual step of refusing to accept new criminal cases and recusing himself from existing ones, in a move observers say is about politics, impropriety and, possibly, hurt feelings....it all started after a ruling in July by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. Prosecutors thought Stadtmueller showed bias in a gun case and took the rare move of asking the appeals court to remove him, which it did. Stadtmueller accused the U.S. Attorney's office of judge-shopping.Before Stadtmueller was given a lifetime appointment to the federal bench in 1987, he ran the U.S. Attorney's office in Milwaukee. Over the years, he has criticized the type of cases his successors have brought to federal court. When Stadtmueller was a prosecutor, most federal cases involved white-collar crimes. Now, there are many more gun and drug cases, and the judge's frustration is apparent in court documents. In taking Stadtmueller off the gun case, the appeals court ruled that he broke judicial rules by suggesting a plea bargain. Stadtmueller had questioned the government's decision to bring the case to federal court, calling it "an embarrassment to the justice system." Documents also show Stadtmueller sought to avoid a conviction that would have sent the defendant to prison for at least 15 years.

Absolute Shame in Wisconsin

Although our blog focuses on the prosecutorial misconduct and political chaos created by the Rove Republican Racket, we wanted to share a story of absolute shame.

This is what politics creates in our legal system when the objective is to indict, hide some evidence, and ask real questions later. Many U.S. Attorneys during the Rove-Bush-Cheney era have engaged in the "indict and plea out" strategy as well.

From Wisconsin as published in the North Country Gazette:

A Wisconsin Circuit Court Judge dismissed rape and murder charges against Ralph Armstrong on Friday based on the misconduct of a Dane County prosecutor who concealed evidence of Armstrong’s innocence. Armstrong was convicted in 1981 of the rape and murder of fellow University of Wisconsin-Madison student Charise Kamps. He has always maintained his innocence. Armstrong’s conviction was overturned by the Wisconsin Supreme Court in 2005 after DNA testing on hair and semen excluded Armstrong as the perpetrator. Prosecutors sought to retry Armstrong, and he has been in custody awaiting retrial for four years. At a hearing in April, a woman testified that she called Assistant District Attorney John Norsetter in 1995 to report that Armstrong’s brother, Stephen, confessed to the crime. Stephen Armstrong was visiting his brother at the University when the crime occurred and was interviewed by police as a possible suspect immediately after the crime. Even though Armstrong’s case was on appeal when Norsetter learned of the confession in 1995, he never told defense attorneys about the phone call and never pursued the lead. Stephen Armstrong has since died.

John Norsetter should be held accountable. Read the full story here.

The Stinging Slap of 2007: Wisconsin

Today, we'll look at the consequences of the Rove Republican Racket in Wisconsin.

Former Milwaukee U.S. Attorney Steve Biskupic went after a Wisconsin state employee in 2006 to try to smear the Democratic Governor of Wisconsin, Jim Doyle, who was running for re-election. She was unfairly prosecuted and convicted.


In 2007, the conviction was overturned by a federal appeals court with a stinging slap.


The Wisconsin State Journal wrote in April of 2007:

A federal appeals court last week slapped down a controversial fraud conviction with a swift, blunt decisiveness almost never seen in the legal system. The ruling struck a blow to the credibility of the Milwaukee-based federal prosecutor who brought the case, and to other investigations related to campaign fundraising by Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle, said former prosecutors and other legal experts.

The investigations have not led to any charges against Doyle or his aides. The federal prosecutor, who was appointed by President Bush, and the state attorney general, a Republican, say they are continuing...."It will be strongly worded," Van Wagner, a Republican, predicted of the judges' written decision. "It's a statement to the government that you never had enough to get out of the starting gate."Donald Downs, a political science professor who teaches criminal law at UW-Madison, said he could only think of one other case in which an appellate court had simply freed a defendant rather than sending the case back to a trial court.

The decision certainly will make it more difficult for U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic in Milwaukee to continue his investigation of the Doyle administration, Downs said. "It's a slap at the prosecution, you better believe it," Downs said. "It's embarrassing." Adding power to the ruling, Tuerkheimer said, was the fact that it was made by a court with two Republican appointees and one Democrat. Judge Frank Easterbrook was appointed by President Reagan, Judge William J. Bauer by President Ford and Judge Diane Wood by President Clinton.

Biskupic's counterpart in Western Wisconsin, U.S. Attorney Erik Peterson did nothing political and focused on the law.

In a profile written over the weekend by the Associated Press and posted by the Chicago Tribune, Peterson, who remained politically neutral and has done his job diligently, was even smeared by the Rove-Bush-Cheney Racket. Peterson today continues serving as U.S. Attorney in Western Wisconsin under the Obama Adminsitration.


The AP writes:

Then-President George W. Bush named Peterson the top federal prosecutor in the 44-county Western District of Wisconsin in June 2006. His counterpart in Milwaukee, now-former U.S. Attorney Steve Biskupic, grabbed the headlines after he brought charges against an aide in Gov. Jim Doyle's administration and his name appeared on documents questioning [Peterson's] performance and loyalty to Bush. A U.S. Justice Department inquiry concluded that despite Bush administration denials, political considerations played a part in the firings of as many as four federal prosecutors. Nine U.S. attorneys in all were fired in 2006.