NAFUSA’s newest life member, Michael Moore, joined Pope McGlamry in its Atlanta office in December 2015. Moore’s practice focuses in the areas of qui tam/false claims litigation, significant fraud and tort cases, and white collar matters.

Moore was appointed by President Obama in 2010 to serve as the United States Attorney for the Middle District of Georgia. As U.S. Attorney, Mr. Moore targeted violent crimes, human trafficking, and public corruption. During his time as the chief federal prosecutor, he oversaw the prosecution of national food safety cases, resulting in record-setting prison sentences for corporate executives and the largest criminal fine ever imposed against a corporation for food safety violations. Mr. Moore took an active role in civil rights matters, overseeing numerous cases involving the brutal mistreatment of arrestees and prison inmates and personally mediated a landmark settlement guaranteeing adequate representation for children and individuals in the Superior Courts.

Moore is credited with growing the false claims practice in the Middle District of Georgia, increasing recoveries for the Government by over 8000 percent during his tenure. His efforts resulted in multi-million dollar settlements and made the Middle District of Georgia a leader in combatting health care fraud.

As United States Attorney, Moore served on the Terrorism and National Security Subcommittee, the Health Care Fraud Working Group, the Criminal Practice Subcommittee, and the White Collar/Fraud Subcommittee, all part of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee.

Prior to his service with the Department of Justice, and following his time as a state prosecutor, Moore practiced privately, representing clients in both civil and criminal matters throughout the state.

Moore is a former member of the Georgia Senate, where he served on the Appropriations, Judiciary, Transportation, and Defense Committees.

Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP announced today that NAFUSA member Benjamin Wagner, former U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of California, will join the firm as a partner in the Palo Alto office.  Wagner’s practice will focus on government investigations and white collar defense. He will join fellow NAFUSA members Chuck Stevens, Ted Olson and Debra Yang at Gibson.

“Ben will be an outstanding addition to the firm,” said Ken Doran, Chairman & Managing Partner of Gibson Dunn.  “He enjoys a very strong reputation within the Department of Justice and is well-connected in the U.S. Attorneys’ community.  He is widely recognized for his superb trial and advocacy skills, his eloquent writing, his sound judgment and his integrity.  With his 24 years in government, capped by six-plus years as the U.S. Attorney, Ben has incredible depth in both criminal and civil litigation and investigations.  He brings experience and gravitas that will reinforce our ability to demonstrate to clients that we can field the strongest team of white collar lawyers with a profound understanding of, and years of experience in, criminal investigations and litigation necessary to resolve their matters effectively.”

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NAFUSA member Richard Pocker has been elected vice president of the Nevada State Bar. Pocker is the administrative partner for the Nevada office of Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP. His practice includes civil and criminal litigation, as well as employment law.  He was selected for inclusion in Best Lawyers in America for 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015.

After his graduation from the University of Virginia Law School in 1980, Pocker’s career began with service in the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General’s Corps with the Seventh Infantry Division, followed by a six-year stint with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Nevada. Beginning as an assistant U.S. attorney in 1985,  Pocker rose through the ranks to become first the chief assistant U.S. attorney, and ultimately the United States Attorney in 1989.

After departing the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Pocker entered private practice, where he was a partner in the Las Vegas law firm of Dickerson, Dickerson, Consul & Pocker from 1991 to 2005. He joined Boies, Schiller & Flexner in 2005.

In 1996, he returned briefly to government service, serving as chief counsel to the Select Subcommittee on the United States Role in the Iranian Arms Transfers to Croatia and Bosnia, leading a congressional investigation of national security intelligence and foreign policy issues on behalf of the International Relations Committee of the United States House of Representatives. He served as chair of the Federal Litigation Section of the Federal Bar Association (2007 to 2010),

Back home in Nevada, he served on the Southern Nevada Disciplinary Board for the Nevada State Bar from 1993 to 2003, the last four years as the Board’s chair.  In 2006, he was honored as a patron of the Nevada Law Foundation, an organization dedicated to the provision of legal services to the indigent. In May 2011 he was elected to the Nevada State Bar’s Board of Governors, and has served on that Board continuously since then, reelected a third term in 2015. In 2015 he was awarded the State Bar of Nevada’s Medal of Justice Award, for his service on the board of the Nevada Bar Foundation.

 

On July 27, 2016, Indian Country Today Media Network.com named NAFUSA members Tim Purdon, Brendan Johnson and Troy Eid to their Five for Fighting Indian Law Practitioners: 2016 Hot List. Suzette Brewer describes the virtues of each:

When Tim Purdon and Brendan Johnson left the U.S. Attorney’s office in North Dakota and South Dakota, respectively, to create the American Indian law division at the national firm of Robins Kaplan LLP in 2015, it caused a minor earthquake in the Indian law community. Many wondered how the Feds would fill these enormous gaps, who would match their many accomplishments. In just under five years as federal prosecutors, they made the radical decision to shift away from decades of friction with the tribes to forge a more collaborative approach to improving public safety on Indian reservations in the Dakotas.

 

Brendan Johnson

In the last year, the two close friends―known as the “Dakota Boys”―have translated that approach to develop the American Indian law division at Robins Kaplan, pushing into new territory as they represent tribal clients, including the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, who recently sued the Indian Health Service for closing down the only emergency room on its reservation in South Dakota, as well as successfully representing Oglala Sioux tribal member Alex White Plume in his industrial hemp case. 

Troy Eid

Fresh out of Stanford and working as a young legislative assistant to Congressman Jim Kolbe of Arizona in the mid-1980s, Troy Eid was thrown in the deep end of tribal politics when he was sent to Arizona to talk with the Navajo Nation leadership regarding the tribe’s appropriations requests. Instead of being politely rejected as another “white” Washington player, the tribe accepted and understood the 22-year-old Eid, who is of Egyptian heritage. “They saw my not being white as positive, rather than negative – as had sometimes been the case when I was growing up,” says Eid, whose father emigrated to the United States from Egypt in 1957. “So while I’m not Native American, they made me feel immediately comfortable in Indian country. I’ve felt that way ever since.” 

After joining Greenberg Traurig in 2003, he helped establish a formal American Indian law division within the firm.

 

 

 

In yesterday’s Berkshire Eagle, NAFUSA Past President Don Stern questioned the comments made by FBI Director James Comey during his announcement that the FBI was not recommending prosecution of Hillary Clinton . See Donald K. Stern: Comey went beyond FBI’s role.

Stern opines that it is not appropriate for a federal law enforcement to publicly announce its view of the evidence before a prosecution decision is made. And “if a decision is made to not prosecute, not at all.” It is the Department of Justice, Stern points out, that decides whether to prosecute a case in the federal system. Nevertheless, Stern sees “a good reason to vary from the norm” when the Attorney General had announced that she would rely on the recommendation of the FBI in making the ultimate decision.

But Stern takes exception to Comey’s laying out facts in the Clinton investigation. It may be “customary when an arrest is made that the federal authorities detail the facts,” Stern points out, but “laying out some facts, to say nothing of the level of detail in Comey’s statement, is what happens when a person is charged. Not when there are no criminal charges brought.”

Stern saves his strongest criticism for Comey’s comments about Clinton’s conduct.

But, he went well beyond that and ventured into unprecedented and dangerous waters. Comey offered his personal opinion that Clinton’s actions were “extremely careless” and talked about possible intrusions by “hostile actors” even if there was no evidence to that effect.

 

I find his comments well beyond the proper role of the FBI. It is one thing to talk generally about an issue (“We need to make our computers more secure and pay more attention to hacking”), but to do so in the context of a case against an individual not charged is remarkable. The public’s right to know does not extend, under any circumstances, this far.

Stern made clear he holds Comey in high regard; he just has a problem with his comments in this particular press conference. 

NAFUSA is sad to report that David Margolis, one of our most beloved members, died shortly after 4 PM today. David has been having serious heart problems for quite some time. He was scheduled to join us in Scottsdale last October to be honored for his 50 years at Justice. He fell just before the conference and was unable to make it. He was honored in absentia nevertheless. He had planned to join us in San Diego this fall to give a talk on his 50, now 51, years as one of the most popular and important career members of DOJ.

David Margolis was an Associate Deputy Attorney General at the U.S. Department of Justice. He served the Department for 51 years under 20 Attorney Generals. He  also served as an acting deputy assistant attorney general, and an acting deputy attorney general by order of the President. From 1982 to 1983, he was on leave of absence at the request of the Attorney General to implement the President’s directive establishing the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces, including recommendations for the allocation of investigative and prosecutive resources, and for national policies and priorities.

His many awards include The Henry E. Peterson Memorial Award (the Criminal Division’s highest award), The President’s Rank Award for Distinguished Service (the highest award for senior federal executives) and the Department of Justice Lifetime Service Award. He was a graduate of Harvard Law School.

On July 13, Carrie Johnson spoke on NPR: Remembering A Career Prosecutor Who Leaned Into Controversy – and Took The Heat. Carrie, who moderated a panel at last year’s NAFUSA conference, captures David’s humor and value to the Department. You can also read statements from Attorney General Loretta Lynch and Deputy AG Sally Yates here.

David’s office is now quiet, but his two baseball jerseys still hang outside his door. The one of the right, “Margolis 40”, was a gift on his 40th year at the Department. The one on the left, “Margolis 50”, was presented last year by NAFUSA. The photo at the top is the last known photo of David in his office.

A memorial service in the Great Hall at the Department of Justice is expected later this summer. 

 

On June 27, 2016, former governor of Virginia Bob McDonnell  won a decisive victory in the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices, in a unanimous decision, rejected the government’s allegations that Gov. McDonnell violated federal bribery laws and vacated all of his convictions for alleged public corruption. The case has been remanded to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. NAFUSA member John Brownlee led the Holland & Knight Team and served as his counsel for over 3 years, working closely with co-counsel, Jones Day.

Beginning in July 2014, Brownlee served as trial counsel as Holland & Knight defended Gov. McDonnell in a nearly two-month jury trial in federal district court in Richmond, Va.  At trial, Holland & Knight successfully defended Gov. McDonnell against charges of bank fraud and crafted the trial record that ultimately allowed for reversal. At the trial’s conclusion, Holland & Knight also argued that the district court’s proposed instruction to the jury on the definition of “official acts”—a definition that encompassed virtually any activity by a public official concerning any subject—was too broad; instead, Holland & Knight argued the court should instruct the jury that “merely arranging a meeting, attending an event, hosting a reception, or making a speech are not, standing alone, ‘official acts.'” The District Court declined to give Holland & Knight’s requested in­struction, and the jury convicted on the public corruption counts.

The Fourth Circuit affirmed the convictions based on that same definition of “official acts.” Gov. McDonnell then requested the U.S. Supreme Court to allow him to remain free on bail pending review of his case. The Supreme Court granted that request—the first of its kind in over 20 years—and on January 15, 2016, granted Gov. McDonnell’s petition for certiorari, indicating that the Court would review the definition of “official acts” as used in the federal corruption laws.

Before the Supreme Court, attorneys for Gov. McDonnell successfully argued that the government’s definition of  “official acts” was too broad. The justices unanimously rejected the government’s definition and adopted a narrowed interpretation of the term “official acts.”  Importantly, the Supreme Court specifically held that “[s]etting up a meeting, talking to another official, or organizing an event (or agreeing to do so)—without more— does not fit th[e] definition of an official act,” which is precisely what Holland & Knight had argued earlier. The Supreme Court vacated all of Gov. McDonnell’s convictions and remanded the case to the Fourth Circuit for further review.

The unanimous decision by the Supreme Court—and its rejection of the government’s understanding of the law and theory of prosecution—will have a tremendous impact on prosecutors and public officials for years to come.

McDonnell v. United States, No. 15-474 slip op. (June 27, 2016). Read the U.S. Supreme Court opinion.