Mesothelioma Resource

Let’s see — a star witness who flirted with perjury and prosecutors who withheld evidence — the W.R. Grace trial? Yes, but it’s also a description of the Ted Stevens trial, which was also prosecuted by U.S. attorneys appointed by President George W. Bush.

This may mean nothing, or it may mean something, but at least it’s worth noting. As I mentioned in the last post, the federal prosecutors who failed to get a conviction in the W.R. Grace asbestos contamination trial are accused of withholding evidence that might have helped the defense. And Judge Donald W. Molloy said that one of the prosecution’s star witnesses “came as close as I would ever want to see to perjury.”

What’s worth noting is that this is essentially the same conduct that caused our new attorney general, Eric Holder, to drop all charges against Senator Ted Stevens of Alaksa. In 2008 the Senator was indicted by a federal grand jury on seven counts of failing to properly report gifts. The gifts included renovations to the Senator’s home by the VECO Corporation, which builds things for the oil industry in Alaska.

Stevens was found guilty in October 2008. So why did Attorney General Holder drop the charges a few months later? There was a pattern of prosecutorial misconduct, but Holder was most disturbed when he learned the federal prosecutors had withheld notes from a meeting with VECO CEO Bill Allen. In the meeting, Allen told the federal prosecutors that the value of the goods and services he’d given Stevens were $80,000. At trial, however, Allen claimed he had provided Senator Stevens with $250,000 worth of goods and services.

This is strikingly similar to the prosecution’s conduct in the recent W.R. Grace trial. To recap: The W.R. Grace Company, which operated mines in the vicinity of Libby, Montana, was accused of spreading deadly asbestos fibers throughout Libby, resulting in 2,000 cases of illness and about 225 deaths from mesothelioma and other asbestos-related diseases. However, on May 8 a jury acquitted Grace and three former executives of all criminal charges.

In the Grace trial, the government withheld evidence that could have been used to discredit key witness Robert Locke, a former Grace executive. Locke testified at trial that he helped officials obstruct a federal health study of the Libby mine. The evidence withheld by the prosecution consisted mostly of emails that revealed Locke’s extreme bias against Grace.

Now, even though the Bush Administration has officially faded into history, the U.S. attorneys appointed by President Bush have not been replaced by President Obama. And given the U.S. attorney scandal, allegations of misconduct by federal prosecutors need to be examined especially critically.

The top federal prosecutor in Montana is William W. Mercer, known to be a Bush team player. According to Richard B. Schmitt of the Los Angeles Times, “When a team of young White House and Justice Department staffers decided to fire a group of U.S. attorneys on Pearl Harbor Day 2006, it was left to Mercer to be the bearer of the bad news to some of the prosecutors.”

Schmitt continued,

“Mercer also had the distinction of simultaneously holding two Justice Department jobs about 2,000 miles apart. Eventually, he had to relinquish one, a senior post at headquarters here.

“Mercer remains the top federal prosecutor in Montana — despite periodic calls for his resignation by a federal judge there and by one of the state’s Democratic senators. He is one of only a few U.S. attorneys who may survive all eight years under Bush.”

We can assume that Mercer was not running a tight ship in Montana. But there’s one more odd connection between the Grace and Stevens cases. In both trials, one might assume the Bush Administration’s interests were in acquittal. Ted Stevens was a Republican senator. The Bush Administration also had a clear pattern of favoring corporate interests over people.

If I were a conspiracy nut, I would put on my tinfoil hat and suggest the Bush-appointed attorneys were instructed to throw the fights. However, plain incompetence is more likely at fault.

May 13, 2009
Barbara O’Brien

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