{"id":5707,"date":"2009-09-01T23:07:45","date_gmt":"2009-09-02T05:07:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=5707"},"modified":"2009-09-24T22:35:01","modified_gmt":"2009-09-25T04:35:01","slug":"u-s-attorneys-letter-was-inappropriate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/09\/u-s-attorneys-letter-was-inappropriate\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. attorney’s letter was inappropriate"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Heath

Heath Haussamen<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cHi. I\u2019m not going to file criminal charges against your clients at this time, even though my investigation revealed wrongdoing. Know that I\u2019m watching your clients. There are other investigations pending, and if circumstances warrant, I might restart this one as well.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Though that\u2019s not a direct quote, that\u2019s essentially what U.S. Attorney Greg Fouratt wrote on Thursday in a letter<\/a> to lawyers representing Gov. Bill Richardson<\/a> and other potential defendants in the investigation into allegations of pay to play<\/a> involving CDR Financial Products<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It was a highly combative letter that was inappropriate. Let me explain.<\/p>\n

Whatever the reason charges weren\u2019t filed, we live in a system in which people are innocent until proven guilty. The United States opted to not file charges against Richardson and others in this case and closed it. So, from a legal standpoint, Richardson and others are innocent, regardless of what Fouratt says.<\/p>\n

That should be the end of the story, unless Fouratt wants to allege something about the motives behind the decision by his bosses in Washington to put an end to the case (if the decision was made in Washington, which is a lingering question<\/a>), or unless he comes across new evidence in the future that leads to the reopening of the case.<\/p>\n

Instead, we have the top federal law enforcement officer in New Mexico publicly alleging wrongdoing in this case while simultaneously informing those under investigation that he has no intention, at least at this time, of trying to prove in a court of law that such wrongdoing occurred.<\/p>\n

Joseph diGenova, a former U.S. attorney, called Fouratt\u2019s letter \u201cstupid\u201d in an interview with The Associated Press<\/a>. That\u2019s because, according to the article, \u201cit makes allegations of corruption after the case is over.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat letter is an outrage and the U.S. attorney who wrote it should be fired. The case is closed. If he had charges, bring them. Otherwise, he should shut up. He\u2019s being a politician now, not a prosecutor,\u201d the news service quoted diGenova as saying.<\/p>\n

The court of law versus the court of public opinion<\/h3>\n

Some will balk at me accusing someone else of not being fair to Richardson. I spend a great deal of time heavily scrutinizing the actions of the governor and his associates. I call him out when his actions create the appearance of impropriety<\/a>, and I plan to continue doing that. I\u2019m currently blacklisted<\/a> by the governor\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

But I\u2019ve been careful in the past to not accuse Richardson of actual wrongdoing. When asked during interviews with other media outlets, I\u2019ve always said I don\u2019t know if a crime was committed.<\/p>\n

I think Richardson and his staffers have tried to toe the line — and sometimes leaned so far over it they almost fell over — in their efforts to raise money. Richardson was launching a presidential bid from a small state. He worked hard to raise every dollar possible.<\/p>\n

CDR is one of the best examples of how those efforts have created an appearance of impropriety. The company gave $110,000 to two Richardson political action committees and his 2006 re-election campaign and won a state contract that paid almost $1.5 million — and the actual contract has vanished, if it ever physically existed in the first place.<\/p>\n

But an appearance of impropriety doesn\u2019t mean actual impropriety existed. Was there a handshake, a head nod, a handwritten note on a napkin through which Richardson or someone close to him agreed to give CDR the contract in exchange for contributions? I\u2019ve never seen proof that there was. And the U.S. attorney doesn\u2019t plan to try to prove that there was such an agreement in this case.<\/p>\n

Fouratt\u2019s job is to prove guilt in a court of law, not in the court of public opinion. Apparently, he needs to be reminded of that.<\/p>\n

Haussamen bio<\/a> \u2502 Commentary archives<\/a> \u2502 Feed<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The United States opted to not file charges against Gov. Bill Richardson and others in the GRIPgate probe and closed the case. So, from a legal standpoint, Richardson and the others are innocent, regardless of what U.S. Attorney Greg Fouratt says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192,10],"tags":[112,122,114,107],"class_list":["post-5707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary","category-haussamen-columns","tag-bill-richardson","tag-gripgate","tag-public-corruption","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5707\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}