Fear Eats The Soul: Stevens Prosecutor Commits Suicide

The botched prosecution and conviction of Ted Stevens, which ended with the court throwing out Stevens' conviction on grounds of prosecutorial misconduct, continues to take its grim toll. Now one of Stevens' prosecutors, who was himself under investigation for his actions during the Stevens case, has committed suicide

A federal prosecutor who was among those being investigated over the Justice Department's troubled pursuit of the late Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens committed suicide over the weekend, his attorney said Monday.

Nicholas Marsh was among several lawyers from the department's public integrity section who were under scrutiny for missteps in the prosecution of Mr. Stevens, including not turning over exculpatory evidence to the defense.

Robert Luskin, Mr. Marsh's lawyer, said the 37-year-old attorney's wife informed him Sunday of the death. Mr. Luskin said he didn't have details of how it occurred. The Metropolitan Police Department in Washington said it didn't have any information about the death. The District of Columbia medical examiner didn't respond to a call seeking comment.

A federal judge dismissed last year Mr. Stevens's conviction on corruption charges, at the request of Attorney General Eric Holder, and appointed a special investigator to probe the Justice Department's handling of the case.

Marsh's attorney says he's bewildered that Marsh would take this step, as he had "every reason to think he would have been exonerated." Of course!

The Stevens prosecution was one of the underreported outrages of the last few years. That is not to say that the story was underreported. The Stevens conviction was trumpeted from the rooftops. It was only the aftermath that has been relegated to briefs squibs on page A-15. Stevens' conviction was on his record for less than a year, yet that was enough for Stevens to lose a seat he would not have otherwise lost. And with that lost seat was also lost the 41st vote to filibuster health care reform, among other things.

Marsh was one of those supposedly "non-partisan" career prosecutors, rather than a political appointee. Yet, he participated in a political prosecution that had outsized political results.

The Death of Ted Stevens

As you may have heard, Ted Stevens has died in a plane crash in the Alaskan bush. This was one disgraced 80+ year old law-maker who was active right up to the end:

Ted Stevens, the longest-serving Republican senator in U.S. history, died after a small plane carrying him and eight others crashed in a remote part of Alaska Monday.

Four others died with the former Alaska senator in the crash outside Dillingham, authorities said. Four survivors were transported to a hospital in Anchorage, about 330 miles northeast of the crash site.

Authorities said the others who died are the 62-year-old pilot, Terry Smith; and Bill Phillips, a former Senate aide to Mr. Stevens. Dana Tindall, 48, a vice president at GCI, the Anchorage telephone and cable company that owned the plane, died along with her 16-year-old daughter, Corey.

The survivors include Sean O'Keefe, the former National Aeronautics and Space Administration chief who is now head of European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co.'s North American unit, and his son Kevin. Mr. Phillips' 13-year-old son, Willy, and another former Senate aide, Jim Morhard, also survived.

Ted Stevens represented the best and worst of the Republican Party and the Senate. On the one hand, he was a flinty-eyed bad ass living on the last American frontier. On the other, he was a power-hungry tax and spender who happily spent other people's money. And, while he was an effective Senator - his job was to represent Alaska's interests in DC, and he certainly did that - he was also a beneficiary of the inertia and incumbency that has infected The World's Greatest Deliberative Body.

Still, I think Stevens deserves a mention of the outrageous manner in which he was evicted from his Senate seat via a prosecution that was later voided for prosecutorial misconduct which included witness tampering, the withholding of exculpatory evidence, and even a sexual relationship between a prosecutor and a government witness. Stevens' conviction held up less than a year, but it was attached to him long enough to cause his narrow 2008 re-election loss to Mark Begich (whose father died in another Alaskan bush plane crash, along with Hale Boggs). That was enough for Alaskans to send a Democrat to the Senate who would otherwise never won his seat, and who provided the crucial 60th vote for Obamacare.

This political prosecution was an unfortunate coda to Stevens' career, but it was even more disastrous for America's political and social life.

UPDATE: funny how these things work - Dan Rostenkowsi has died. "Rosty" served in the House almost as long as Stevens served in the Senate. He also left office under the cloud of a felony prosecution. The only difference? Rostenkowsi actually served time in prison. No need for prosecutors to cheat to nail this guy. He was as corrupt as you could imagine a Chicago pol could be. But, he was also "beloved" by Dems and the media, so his corruption will undoubtedly be downplayed as much as Stevens' fake corruption was shouted from the rooftops.

Two Injustices Don't Make Justice

US Attorney General Eric Holder has been studiously seeking out Bush-era "injustices" at the Justice Department, and has finally found a politically motivated prosecution in which Justice Department lawyers engaged in wide-ranging prosecutorial misconduct including the hiding of exculpatory evidence, witness tampering, and even a sexual relationship between a prosecutor and a gov't witness.

The object of all of this skullduggery? Ted Freakin' Stevens! Now, Holder is moving to void the conviction to avoid further disclosures: Justice Dept. Seeks To Void Stevens' Conviction

Stevens was the poster-boy for corrupt governance. He served neither his constituents, nor his party, well. He acted primarily to benefit his campaign donors and then bristled when called on it. And he was so maladroit that he couldn't even defend a benefit to his constituents- the infamous "Bridge To Nowhere." He was useless, and yet he was returned to the Senate decade after decade for no better reason than inertia and incumbency. If anyone needs a reason to establish term limits for US Senators, Stevens is Exhibit A.

Still, everyone - even Ted Stevens - deserves a fair trial, and he did not get one. This result, with Holder withdrawing any further prosecution in part to prevent further judicial inquiries into the Justice Department attorneys' misconduct is unsatisfactory.

Was Stevens really guilty of corruption, or was it indeed a political prosecution designed to remove a Republican vote from the Senate? Given the narrowness of Stevens' loss last November, it's clear he would have won re-election without a criminal conviction temporarily on his record.

Have the voters in Alaska been well served by this? No. Now they have a Senator who would not have his seat, but for the deus ex machinations of prosecutors 8,000 miles away. They have also lost Stevens' seniority, which is a valuable political tool for any state.

Has our political system been well-served by this? Not really. I mean, it's nice the Stevens is out of the Senate, but he was ejected in a manner that would be labeled a coup if it had happened to the President. It certainly doesn't make the supposed "ethics" rules that were being enforced with this action look good. If such rules are effective, why do proscutors need to engage in this level of misconduct to enforce them? (My experience with attorneys who are stickler for ethics violations: they are often less ethical than the average, but noisily use trumped up ethics complaints against their foes)

And, the Justice Department comes out of this looking lousy, too. Holder wants to forestall further inquiry. The opposite should be happening. We need to find out what these attorneys were up to. The Justice Department is an elite posting for any attorney. How is it that things went so wrong with this group? For now this has a "Catholic Church moving poedophile priests around" quality.

Sadly, no one cares about an injustice against a guy like Stevens, so I suspect this will be the last we'll hear of this until Stevens' obituaries are published.