Context of 'October 24, 2001: McKay Sworn in as US Attorney for Western Washington State'

John McKay. [Source: Seattle Times]John McKay is sworn in as the US Attorney for the Western District of Washington State. McKay has little or no experience as a prosecutor; most of his legal career has been spent in private practice, except for a brief stint as a special assistant to then-FBI Director William Sessions. [US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 9/29/2008; Talking Points Memo, 2011] McKay was president of the Congressionally established Legal Services Corporation in Washington, DC, a private non-profit corporation designed to ensure low-income citizens receive adequate legal representation. He was a White House Fellow in 1989-1990, where he worked with Sessions. [US Department of Justice, 12/14/2006] There are 93 US Attorneys serving in the 50 states as well as in Puerto Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands, and the Northern Marianas. All US Attorneys are appointed by the president with the advice and consent of the Senate, and serve under the supervision of the Office of the Attorney General in the Justice Department. They are the chief law enforcement officers for their districts. They serve at the pleasure of the president and can be terminated for any reason at any time. Typically, US Attorneys serve a four-year term, though they often serve for longer unless they leave or there is a change in presidential administrations. [US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 9/29/2008]

Thomas Wales. [Source: FBI]Newly appointed US Attorney John McKay of the Western District of Washington State (see October 24, 2001) begins investigating the murder of Thomas C. Wales, an Assistant US Attorney (AUSA) in the office. Wales, a popular AUSA and a strong advocate of gun control, was murdered three weeks before McKay took office, when someone shot and killed him through his basement window. Associate Deputy Attorney General David Margolis had recused the office from investigating the crime, because, McKay will later state, the Justice Department (DOJ) had no confidence in the prosecutor initially assigned to the case. Moreover, as the case was a likely candidate for a death penalty prosecution, he will tell a reporter that the office is recused because “[y]ou couldn’t have Tom’s friends in the office making those kinds of decisions.”
Begins Pressuring Justice Department - Shortly after taking office, McKay begins pressuring Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Larry Thompson to replace the prosecutor on the Wales case. McKay will recall having several “tense conversations” with Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Christopher Wray concerning this issue. In March 2002, the DOJ assigns a more experienced prosecutor to the case. The DOJ sends no additional manpower to Seattle to help with the case, and initially offers a $25,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of the killer, an amount FBI Special Agent Charles Mandigo will later call “insultingly small.” (After McKay’s intervention, the DOJ later raises the reward to $1 million.) McKay later says that while he is not directly involved in the investigation, he pushed hard for the DOJ to commit more resources to the investigation, and felt it was his responsibility to act as a conduit between the Seattle FBI office and the DOJ regarding resources for the case. He will say that while he was assertive, he remained professional and appropriate in his conduct; no one in the DOJ ever complained to him about his actions, he will say. “My mistake was that I assumed ‘recusal’ was ‘recusal’,” he will say. “I had erred in assuming that I was completely recused from even asking questions about the allocation of resources. I assumed it would have the highest priority within the Department of Justice. I once worked at the FBI for a year, and during that time an agent was killed in Las Vegas. They deploy like crazy when an agent is killed. Agents got off the airplane that night from DC to investigate. The director of the FBI flew out. That was not the reaction we were getting from the Department of Justice after Tom Wales was killed. Over 2002, I decided that really it should be my job to advocate for appropriate resources to be devoted to the Wales case.”
Speculation as to Politicization of Investigation - Many involved in the investigation believe that the Wales murder is a low priority for the DOJ because his liberal politics clash with the rightward tilt of the senior officials appointed by the Bush administration.
Aggressive but Appropriate - A 2008 Justice Department investigation of the 2006 US Attorney firings (see September 29, 2008) will find no reason to dispute McKay’s recollection of events. Both Thompson and Wray will describe McKay as being aggressive about making sure the investigation has adequate resources. Thompson will recall no tension between himself and McKay, though he will recall some of his then-staff members complaining about McKay’s pressure and demands for resources. Thompson will admit to becoming irritated with McKay on occasion, but will emphasize that McKay conducted himself in an appropriate manner at all times. It was “not new in the annals of the Department of Justice [that] a DAG got aggravated with a US Attorney,” he will say. He will not recall discussing the matter with Kyle Sampson, the chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and the architect of the plan to fire the US Attorneys (see November 15, 2006). Wray will recall that some in the DOJ considered McKay to be “high maintenance,” in regard to the Wales investigation and with other issues. While some in the DAG’s office informally discussed McKay’s behavior among themselves, Wray will recall, no formal review of his conduct was ever undertaken. Wray will also not recall any discussions with Sampson, though he will say he kept Gonzales’s office apprised of the events surrounding the Wales investigation. Margolis will recall McKay being somewhat emotional about the Wales case and extremely pushy, he found his conduct entirely justifiable considering the situation. Margolis will say that he doubts Sampson would have listed McKay for removal because of his interactions with Thompson. [New Yorker, 8/6/2007; US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 9/29/2008]
Remains Unsolved - The Wales murder will remain unsolved. [New Yorker, 8/6/2007]

John McKay, the US Attorney for the Western District of Washington (see October 24, 2001), undergoes his first Evaluation and Review Staff (EARS) performance evaluation, as mandated by the Justice Department. The evaluation is positive, stating that “McKay was setting appropriate goals and priorities and was doing an outstanding job furthering interagency cooperation.… McKay was well respected by his staff, the judiciary, and all the law enforcement and civil agencies.” [US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 9/29/2008] A follow-up letter from the Executive Office for US Attorneys shows that McKay’s office garnered one of the highest cumulative scores (4.71 out of a possible 5) of all 93 US Attorneys’ Offices. The letter singles out McKay’s work on border enforcement strategies. and notes several areas in which McKay’s office displayed “best practices” in individual areas. McKay himself receives particular praise for his management of his office. Another follow-up letter effusively praises McKay’s work with anti-terrorism concerns, particularly his prosecution of several high-profile terrorism cases. He also receives recognition for outstanding work with white collar crime, firearms, child exploitation, environmental, and drug cases, and in implementing a new program to assist victims of fraud in receiving restitution. [US House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary, 5/21/2007]

At the urging of US Attorney John McKay (see October 24, 2001), the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) agrees to fund an information database system that will become known as the Northwest Law Enforcement Information Exchange (LInX). The database is intended to let local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies share information. McKay has the support of Deputy Attorney General James Comey, who has the power to direct Justice Department agencies to share their records with the project. When McKay explains the project to Comey, Comey envisions the project being used as part of the “OneDOJ” initiative to persuade Justice Department law enforcement agencies to share information with one another and with state and local law enforcement. Comey will call McKay a “visionary” concerning information sharing, and supports McKay’s efforts wholeheartedly. [US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 9/29/2008]

Washington State businessman Tom McCabe, the executive vice president of the Building Industry Association of Washington (BIAW) and a prominent Republican activist, is angered by what he considers “voter fraud” in the disputed gubernatorial election between Christine Gregoire (D-WA) and Dino Rossi (R-WA—see December 23, 2004 - January 12, 2005). He is further frustrated by what he considers the reluctance by Republican John McKay (see October 24, 2001 and Late 2004 or Early 2005), the US Attorney for Western Washington, to pursue the allegations. McCabe repeatedly contacts the White House to demand McKay’s firing. McKay will later say, “There was no evidence, and I am not going to drag innocent people in front of a grand jury.” McCabe told McKay he had evidence of forged signatures on absentee ballots cast for Gregoire (see December 2004), and attempted to persuade the FBI to launch an investigation. Neither McKay nor the FBI will be convinced by McCabe’s evidence (see January 4, 2005). Of McKay’s refusal to pursue the allegations, McCabe later recalls, “It started me wondering whether the US Attorney was doing his job.” McKay later says that the FBI concluded that the ballots cited by McCabe were not forgeries. [Seattle Times, 3/13/2007; Talking Points Memo, 2011]

One of several official logos for the LInX program. [Source: NCIS]Deputy Attorney General James Comey asks US Attorney John McKay (see October 24, 2001) to lead a pilot program in Seattle for entering Justice Department (DOJ) law enforcement information into a new information-sharing system called the Northwest Law Enforcement Information Exchange (LInX—see Early 2004). McKay has been a vocal proponent of the new program and has enjoyed Comey’s support for the program. Comey knows that he and McKay will encounter resistance from some DOJ agencies who jealously guard their information. Comey’s memo directs DOJ agency heads to participate in the program and gives deadlines for uploading information into the new system. McKay will later say the DOJ’s law enforcement agencies do not fully comply with Comey’s directive. Moreover, when Comey resigns in the spring of 2005, no one in the DOJ pressures agency heads to comply with the program directives. Enthusiasm for the project will wane further when Comey’s successor, Paul McNulty, takes the position. [US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 9/29/2008]

US Attorney John McKay of the Western District of Washington State (see October 24, 2001) has been pursuing allegations of voter fraud in the highly disputed governor’s race between Christine Gregoire (D-WA) and Dino Rossi (R-WA—see December 2004 and December 23, 2004 - January 12, 2005). McKay has worked with the FBI on the investigation. He has met with FBI and Justice Department officials, who together have reviewed the evidence and concluded that there are no grounds to open a federal grand jury investigation. Craig Donsanto, the head of the election crimes branch of the criminal division’s public integrity section in the Justice Department, has also advised McKay to refrain from any proactive investigation, but merely to collect facts and information, and monitor the state court litigation surrounding the election, because the department wants to make sure not to give the impression that it is trying to influence the litigation. McKay drafts a public statement for use by the FBI and his office to respond to questions surrounding the controversy. The statement says that while the FBI would receive and evaluate all complaints of voter fraud, because the race is a state election matter, citizens should also provide that information to state officials. McKay and the FBI will continue to examine evidence presented to them as “voter fraud,” and will determine that none of it proves any criminality whatsoever. Moreover, the Justice Department will confirm that in as the governor’s race is a state matter, the US Attorney, a federal law enforcement office, has no jurisdiction over allegations about the race. [US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 9/29/2008]