Legal Commentary

Audit: DOJ Isn't Spending All Its Anti-Terrorism Money On Anti-Terrorism

By TChris

The Justice Department diverted funds that Congress designated for terrorism prosecutions to the prosecution of other crimes, according to an audit (pdf) by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine. From 2003 to 2007, Congress funded positions for 250 to 293 prosecutors to focus on terrorism. During that time, the Justice Department never assigned more than 204 prosecutors to terrorism cases. U.S. Attorneys used some of the funding to prosecute other crimes, including health care fraud and drug distribution. The audit also concluded that the U.S. Attorneys underutilized available resources.

While this AP story contends that the audit "raises questions about how prosecutors around the country allocate their time among top crime-fighting priorities," U.S. Attorneys aren't to blame for using their prosecutors where they're needed. No matter how much money Congress wants to allocate to terrorism prosecution, there just aren't many credible terrorist threats to prosecute. Prosecutors can convene grand jury investigations and prepare search warrant applications and otherwise assist federal agents with their investigations, but if those investigations go nowhere (as they so often have), the prosecutors are wasting their time and our money. U.S. Attorneys can assign prosecutors to chat with each other about the unproductive terrorism investigations they're leading, or they can assign those prosecutors to useful work.

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[The report] comes amid concerns that the FBI is too strapped by counterterrorism cases to fully investigate financial firms that may have contributed to the nation's economic crisis.

The Bush administration devoted enormous resources to anti-terrorism since 9/11 but unearthed few legitimate threats. What's the greater risk to our nation? Domestic terrorist attacks or the financial fraud that contributed to an economic crisis? As huge sums of money are funneled into the financial industry, wouldn't it be wise to use some of those investigators and prosecutors to provide bailout oversight? We shouldn't abandon investigation of legitimate threats, but we also shouldn't complain when public resources are allocated according to need.

Side note: for the wonkishly inclined, or for those who are curious about what their U.S. Attorneys Offices are up to, the audit is packed full of interesting facts, charts, maps, acronyms, and cool phrases like "burn rates." The report also frets that prosecutors don't keep close track of how they spend their time and recommends some user-friendly paperwork to solve the problem. Right. Good luck with that, Mr. Fine.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on November 11, 2008 (boomark / email).