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Former vice president Richard B. Cheney told a special prosecutor in 2004 that he could not remember playing any role in leaking the identity of Valerie Plame as a clandestine CIA officer, according to FBI records released under court order Friday. In his May 8, 2004, interview with Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, Cheney said he could not recall when he learned that Plame, the wife of Iraq war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV, worked for the CIA; could not recall telling his chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, about Plame's employment; and could not recall telling Libby to disclose...

Has anyone stayed on this story?

Politics: The career of Roland Burris, a political cipher from Illinois who became a U.S. senator and the lamest of ducks, is over. He can now retire into the obscurity he so richly deserves.Having obtained the seat under a cloud of typical Illinois corruption, Burris announced Friday he won't run for a full term in 2010. He was appointed by the former and recently impeached Gov. Rod Blagojevich who, among his other accomplishments, tried to auction off the seat formerly held by Barack Obama. Blagojevich was forced out of office and may soon join other Illinois governors who went on...

When published in hardback in 2006, Peter Lance’s investigative book, Triple Cross, deserved more attention than it got. Thanks to U.S Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, the prosecutor of Scooter Libby and Rod Blagojevich, the paperback release of Triple Cross will get much more attention than the hardback release did three years ago. "Of particular interest to me, Lance details how the Ali Mohamed case intersected with the TWA Flight 800 case, a subject that Lance is not afraid to tackle." Fitzgerald does not approve of the book’s thesis, a thesis embedded in the original subtitle, “How Bin Laden’s Master Spy Penetrated...

Peter Lance, author of Triple Cross, a book critical of Patrick Fitzgerald and in particular his handling of material and witnesses which handled otherwise might have prevented 9/11, details the latter's efforts to intimidate his publisher into censoring the book before it is published in paperback. [Lance: While nobody invites litigation, I look forward to sitting across a table from Mr. Fitzgerald at a deposition. It would give me a chance to grill him the same way he’s gone after many others. I have a reporter’s notebook full of questions: Why did Al Qaeda master spy Ali Mohamed outmaneuver him...

In the first hour, investigative reporter Peter Lance will talk about the attempts by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald to kill his book, Triple Cross http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060886889/ctoc . Then, former KGB agent and intelligence expert Oleg Kalugin ( http://www.amazon.com/Spymaster-Thirty-two-Intelligence-Espionage-Against/dp/0465014453/ctoc ) will discuss Soviet propaganda, including mysterious disappearances and cover-ups, and give us an insider account of what it was like to be a spy working behind the Iron Curtain.

On May 28, Jeffrey Taylor resigned as acting US Attorney for the District of Columbia. I have not heard from one person who got a response from him regarding their quo warranto letters. I did hear from one person who had proof that their QW letter to Taylor had been rerouted to the White House. There is much speculation as to why Taylor resigned. I think it’s interesting to note that while he didn’t file a quo warranto regarding Obama’s eligibility, he also never told anyone who wrote to him that Obama was actually eligible and that Obama had been...

U.S. attorney says business could help cut murder rate, hire teens as interns U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald stood before a room packed with business officials Thursday and asked them to do something they probably have never considered: Hire felons Not exactly the kind of request you'd expect from the area's top federal law enforcement official, who's better known for locking up criminals. But Fitzgerald told the audience that while law enforcement targets the worst of the worst, the community needs to get more involved -- especially the business community -- to help drive down murder numbers and keep kids out...

BREAKING: U.S. Attorney to indict elected official @ 2:05 pm by Eric Zimmermann The U.S. Attorney's Office in Chicago will reportedly indict an elected official today. Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald will hold a 2PM CST press conference where he is expected to announce the indicment. No details have been released on who the elected official is, including whether it's a federal, state or local official.

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald says the business community can help reduce violence in Chicago by hiring ex-convicts. Fitzgerald told a Chicago civic club on Thursday that jobs help ex-offenders stay away from the criminal activity that landed them in jail. Job opportunities for ex-offenders are part of Project Safe Neighborhoods, a joint effort between law enforcement, government and community partners to help reduce gun violence in Chicago. Many people with criminal records want the chance to do something different with their lives and Fitzgerald called it "negligent" not to think about ways to help them.

The arrest of Governor Rod Blagojevich in December cast a shadowy light on the relationships among four leading players in the Illinois Democratic Party—Blagojevich, Barack Obama, Rahm Emanuel, and David Axelrod. The new president and his two aides would like to minimize their dealings with the disgraced ex-governor. But the record tells a more complex story By David Bernstein (page 1 of 4) In the days following his arrest on corruption charges last December 9th, Governor Rod Blagojevich did his best to appear busy. He visited his 16th-floor suite at the Thompson Center, once even showing up in a jogging...

Robert D. Grant, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was joined by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, in announcing the arrest of MOHAMMED T. ALKARAMLA, age 24, of 6029 North Artesian in Chicago. ALKARAMLA was arrested earlier today at his residence, without incident, by members of the Chicago FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF). ALKARAMLA, who is a Jordanian national, was charged in a criminal complaint filed today in U.S. District Court in Chicago with one (1) count of sending an Interstate Threatening Communication, which is...

A judge for the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois [official website] on Friday rejected an attempt by former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich [JURIST news archive] to have US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of the US Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Illinois [official website] removed from his federal corruption case. The ruling by Judge James Holderman denied [Bloomberg report] Blagojevich's request to disqualify Fitzgerald from the case. Blagojevich had argued that Fitzgerald should be removed from the case for making biased and inflammatory remarks during a January press conference. In January, the Illinois State Senate voted...

From NBC's Pete Williams Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney in Chicago who brought criminal fraud charges against Rod Blagojevich, will be staying in his job in the Obama administration, even though he was appointed to the position by President George W. Bush. U.S. attorneys are political appointees. The normal practice, when there's a change of political parties in the White House, is for the incoming administration to replace all 93 U.S. attorneys with appointees from the new president's party. For now, the Obama administration has asked the current Republican-appointed U.S. attorneys to remain in their posts while it considers how...

On his first day as a private citizen, now unemployed and with a federal indictment bearing down on him, Rod Blagojevich should stick to his routine, put on his track suit and go for a run. He usually runs 5 miles at a brisk pace, but the new route I'm proposing would take about 8 miles. He's in shape for it, and he's got the time. From his Northwest Side home he should run south on Ashland, to Lincoln Avenue, and head southeast on his way downtown. His wife, Patti, can drive the car and meet him there with a...

"And on the fifth day, subpoenas were served to Obama senior staff." That's how Doug Ross of Director Blue puts it, describing the import of the story the media chose to ignore. In the deadest news hole of the week, Saturday, the list of subpoenas served by Patrick Fitzgerald was released. It contained:

On Monday, January 26, 2009, the impeachment trial of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich begins. Nominally, the trial will be held by the Illinois Senate with the Chief Justice of the Illinois Supreme Court presiding. In reality, this case is, and always has been, under the control of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. The impeachment process started just days after Fitzgerald held his now famous press conference on December 9, 2008, in which Fitzgerald announced that Blagojevich was guilty of various crimes while in office, most spectacularly the attempt to sell Barack Obama's vacant Senate seat. The charge was made in a...

CHICAGO (AP) — Gov. Rod Blagojevich's defense attorneys have asked a federal judge to throw U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald and all his assistants off the fraud and bribery case against him. Chief defense counsel Edward Genson said in a motion Thursday that the news conference Fitzgerald held in announcing the charges was so filled with prejudicial publicity that the prosecutor should bow out. The full text of the motion wasn't immediately available because it had been filed under seal. But it was described by U.S. District Court Chief Judge James Holderman, who ordered it unsealed, and by Blagojevich attorney Sheldon...

Reporting from Chicago -- Federal prosecutors have been granted an extra three months to seek an indictment of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. U.S. Chief District Court Judge James Holderman entered an order allowing the indictment deadline to be extended from Jan. 7 to April 7, according to the court docket in the Blagojevich case. Prosecutors had sought the extension last week, citing the complexity of their investigation of pay-to-play politics in the Blagojevich administration. The government charged Blagojevich in a criminal complaint, citing the need for speed to keep him from allegedly making a deal to sell his appointment to...

In a meeting last month with the Barack Obama’s transition staff, representatives of the nation’s top prosecutors caught a glimpse of the president-elect’s thinking on the politically fraught issue of what to do with the the current 93 U.S. attorneys. “[The president-elect] is going to be smart and be cautious. My gut feeling is it won’t be like it was in 1993,” said U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton of Texas’ Western District, a member of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee of U.S. Attorneys. On Dec. 11, Sutton and 15 other members of the committee met with Obama’s DOJ transition chief, David...

Illinois is the laughing stock of America and even the world, but you can’t say it just happened because of the scandal engulfing our governor, Rod Blagojevich. It’s been that way for a long time. The difference is that today, many in Illinois politics, Republicans and Democrats, are exploiting it for their own selfish agendas. The people declaring that Illinois is the nation’s laughing stock the most are in fact politicians, elected and government officials from Illinois, all seeking some personal advantage in the Blagojevich scandal. But the real challenge we face is not what the rest of America thinks...

U.S. Attorney Seeks Extension to Indict Blagojevich Patrick Fitzgerald has asked the court to grant him 90 days to review massive amounts of materials in the case against the Illinois governor.

CHICAGO — Federal prosecutors who recorded the telephone conversations of Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich as part of a criminal investigation are asking a judge whether they may turn over four recordings to state lawmakers who are conducting an impeachment inquiry against him. The recordings, parts of which prosecutors described in an affidavit made public on Dec. 9 when Mr. Blagojevich was arrested on federal corruption charges, have emerged as a focal point in the problems surrounding him. The Illinois House committee conducting the impeachment inquiry wants to hear them, as do Mr. Blagojevich’s lawyers. The parts already publicly described are...

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- The lead attorney for Gov. Rod Blagojevich said he plans to submit President-elect Barack Obama's internal report on contacts with the scandal-plagued governor to the Illinois House committee weighing impeachment. Attorney Ed Genson told the Chicago Sun-Times on Sunday the report would support Blagojevich's claims that he hasn't done anything wrong in his handling of Obama's vacant U.S. Senate seat. Earlier in the week, Obama released the internal report supporting his insistence that there had been no inappropriate contact with the governor's office by Obama or his staff. State Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, chairwoman of the committee,...

The Illinois House committee investigating a possible impeachment of Gov. Rod Blagojevich won't subpoena two incoming White House advisers, the committee chairwoman said Saturday, shutting down a request from the governor's attorney. In a letter received by the committee Friday, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald asked the special investigative committee specifically to not subpoena President-elect Barack Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, incoming chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. and Nils Larsen, a Tribune Co. executive vice president. Fitzgerald said any such subpoenas "would interfere with the ongoing criminal investigation into the activities of Governor Rod Blagojevich and others."...

Every president for more than three decades has had to talk with federal prosecutors at one time or another. President-elect Barack Obama may have set a land speed record by giving his first interview to investigators even before taking the oath of office. Obama sat down last week with four investigators looking into the alleged attempt to sell his former Senate seat. As a witness, rather than a target, Obama seems to have had an easier time with the experience than some of his predecessors. But it is certainly not the way he wanted to begin his presidency. "Here the...

"These accounts were communicated to the Office of the United States Attorney in interviews that were conducted last week. At the request of the Office, we delayed the release of this report until such time as the interviews could be completed. The interviews took place over a period of three days: Thursday, December 18, 2008 (the President-Elect); December 19, 2008 (Valerie Jarrett); and December 20, 2008 (Rahm Emanuel)."

I’m not sure whether it’s the 4:30pm timing or the fact that Rahm Emanuel is in Africa that’s my favorite part of the Obama team’s Blago internal review “drop and run” scenario. Really, as others note, the MSM is so placid the Obama team probably could have gotten away with releasing it outside the holiday rush and even answering some questions. But this approach only adds to the “transparency in name only” phenomenon and will irritate a few of the more conscientious reporters. (We note that we already have gone from “no” contacts to “no inappropriate contacts with Blago” with...

President-elect Barack Obama's transition office said in a report released Tuesday that its staff had no inappropriate communications with the office of Democratic Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who is at the center of a corruption probe. The five-page report identified incoming White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel as the only aide who had direct contact with Mr. Blagojevich. Mr. Emanuel "had one or two" telephone conversations with the governor between Nov. 6 and Nov. 8 to discuss his own resignation from the U.S. House as well as potential nominees to fill the Illinois Senate seat being vacated by Mr....

In a letter earlier this week, the committee of 21 lawmakers conducting the impeachment hearing had asked Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the United States attorney who charged Mr. Blagojevich with conspiracy to commit fraud and bribery, for his guidance on how it should proceed. The legislators also requested a four-page litany of specific information, including the identities of all the witnesses who may have been granted immunity in the case, or who are cooperating with prosecutors. In a politely worded response, Mr. Fitzgerald wrote that he had carefully considered his office’s legal obligations and the special sensitivities involved, concluding that “producing...

What really happened with Jackson Jr., feds Congressman talked with authorities about Blagojevich but never met them face-to-face December 22, 2008 There has been a lot reported about U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr.'s cooperation with authorities since Jackson's name surfaced in the investigation of Gov. Blagojevich's alleged scheme to sell the Senate seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama. But some reports seem to have drawn too much from Jackson's initial statements that he'd been helping federal authorities look into possible wrongdoing by the governor. Some news reports strayed so far that Jackson's spokesman, Kenneth Edmonds, felt the need to clarify...

The wide-ranging public corruption probe that led to the arrest of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich got its first big break when a grandmother of six walked into a breakfast meeting with shakedown artists wearing an FBI wire. Pamela Meyer Davis had been trying to win approval from a state health planning board for an expansion of Edward Hospital, the facility she runs in a Chicago suburb, but she realized that the only way to prevail was to retain a politically connected construction company and a specific investment house. Instead of succumbing to those demands, she went to the FBI and...

Gigot: You said that--recently, you wrote for The Wall Street Journal--that although you are a Republican, you take no pleasure in seeing a prosecutor break--violate his ethical obligations in prosecuting a Democrat. How did Patrick Fitzgerald violate ethical standards? Toensing: There's a very strict rule for prosecutors, Paul, and that is, you are not supposed to say anything that would heighten public condemnation of the defendant. In other words, you're not supposed to try to taint the jury pool. We, people in criminal law, call it, you're not supposed to talk outside the four corners of the complaint or the...

Invoking his wartime commander-in-chief authority, NEWSWEEK Editor Jon Meacham has granted yours truly, a lowly investigative correspondent, sweeping subpoena power to demand that President-elect Barack Obama and his transition team answer all my questions about their dealings with Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who stands accused of putting Obama's vacant U.S. Senate up for sale to the highest bidder. (He vowed on Dec. 19 to fight the charges "until I take my last breath.") It remains unclear whether Obama's assorted spinmeisters and lawyers will honor these subpoenas—or even return my phone calls. But in the meantime, the public at least deserves...

Suppose you're Bashir Assad or Putin, and you watch the Blago Blowup, a month before the next president even takes office. What are you thinking right now? First, Obama looks vulnerable to blackmail. His homey network is full of people who can't stand the light of day. They know all kinds of things the leftist media suppress -- people like Auchi (the Iraqi billionaire), Rezko (the corrupt Syrian multimillionaire), Emil Jones (the Godfather of Southside), and the whole Daley Machine. That's not even counting the freaky radicals or the pols Obama has surrounded himself with. Mayor Daley's brother is one...

It’s a little bit frustrating,” Obama said of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald’s request that he not release until next week a report his office has compiled of contacts between his office and Blagojevich’s. “There’s been a lot of speculation in the press I would love to correct immediately. We are abiding by the request of the U.S. Attorney’s office, but it’s not going to be that long. By next week, you guys will have the answers to all your questions.” As Obama spoke, Emanuel stood against a wall smiling and holding his chin, exchanging an occasional comment with Obama senior...

Illinois lawmakers could be forced to build their impeachment case against Gov. Rod Blagojevich on a raft of relatively small grievances, rather than the blockbuster Senate-seat-for-sale allegations, for fear of undermining federal prosecutors' criminal investigation. Members of the state House impeachment committee said Thursday they will do nothing that would interfere with the investigation by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. If Fitzgerald asks lawmakers not to interview certain witnesses, they will abide by that, they said. "We do not want to get in the way of the United States attorney doing the work he does, and so whatever he says about...

Will the Blagojevich scandal damage the incoming Obama administration? Given Rod Blagojevich’s profane railings against Barack Obama, revealed on federal wiretaps, few observers believe — although none know for sure — that the Obama camp engaged in any pay-for-play dealings with the governor, and therefore few see any legal problems for Team Obama resulting from the criminal investigation. But that’s not the only way the incoming administration might be caught up in the Blagojevich affair. The probe is being conducted, after all, by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, the man who prosecuted one of the most intensely investigated and politically-charged perjury-and-false-statements...

At today's Chicago press conference, Obama was pressed by only one reporter out of four about embattled Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. The president-elect cut the Chicago reporter off -- claiming that he didn’t want to “waste” their time –- before they could finish a question about Blagojevich. “Do you have another question?” Obama asked, indicating the reporter should move on to another subject. However, the reporter continued, trying to get Obama to remedy a seeming conflict between Obama’s “hands-off” approach dealing with the Blagojevich investigation and his promise for openness and transparency.

A committee of the Illinois House considering evidence and testimony in an impeachment inquiry against Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich adjourned its first day of hearings after about an hour on Tuesday, after the governor’s lawyer and the federal prosecutor seeking to indict him both expressed concerns. Members of the 21-member committee, appointed Monday, said that United States Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald had asked for them more details about the witnesses the committee planned to call in its hearings. Mr. Fitzgerald asked the committee for a formal letter outlining its plans, indicating some reluctance about having witnesses testify who might harm...

Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney for Illinois' Northern District first achieved national prominence when he was appointed special prosecutor in the investigation of the so-called "outing" of CIA operative Valerie Plame. Fitzgerald brought charges against White House insider Scooter Libby, but most would agree the call for the prosecution of Libby was driven by politics and Fitzgerald was simply doing the job he was given. Fitzgerald, who was first appointed to his position in Illinois by then-U.S. Senator Peter Fitzgerald (no relation), has done an outstanding job rooting out political corruption for nearly a decade, no matter in what Party...

Ever since the country’s founding, prosecutors, defense lawyers and juries have been trying to define the difference between criminality and political deal-making. They have never established a clear-cut line between the offensive and the illegal, and the hours of wiretapped conversations involving Mr. Blagojevich, filled with crass, profane talk about benefiting from the Senate vacancy, may fall into a legal gray area. Robert S. Bennett, one of Washington’s best-known white-collar criminal defense lawyers, said Mr. Blagojevich faced nearly insurmountable legal problems in a case that includes a raft of corruption accusations unrelated to Mr. Obama’s Senate seat. But Mr. Bennett...

Conventional wisdom holds that U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald ordered the FBI to arrest Rod Blagojevich before sunrise Tuesday in order to stop a crime from being committed. That would have been the sale of the Senate seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama. But the opposite is true: Members of Fitzgerald’s team are livid the scheme didn’t advance, at least for a little longer, according to some people close to Fitzgerald’s office. Why? Because had the plot unfolded, they might have had an opportunity most feds can only dream of: A chance to catch the sale of a Senate seat on...

Conventional wisdom holds that U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald ordered the FBI to arrest Rod Blagojevich before sunrise Tuesday in order to stop a crime from being committed. That would have been the sale of the Senate seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama. But the opposite is true: Members of Fitzgerald’s team are livid the scheme didn’t advance, at least for a little longer, according to some people close to Fitzgerald’s office. Why? Because had the plot unfolded, they might have had an opportunity most feds can only dream of: A chance to catch the sale of a Senate seat on...

Something is rotten in the state," says Marcellus in "Hamlet." Well, it certainly is in the state of Illinois. Yet, on hearing U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald describe a plot by his governor to sell his Senate seat -- "conduct (that) would make Lincoln roll over in his grave" -- how did reform President Barack Obama respond? "I had no contact with the governor or his office, and so I was not aware of what was happening. ... And as I said, it is a sad day for Illinois. Beyond that, I don't think it's appropriate to comment."

Did Obama Fail Ethics Requirements of Illinois Bar?A federal source of mine with ties to Chicago says that FBI agents had enough to prosecute corrupt, helmet-haired Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich back in June, when he was already engaged in some of the blackmail and extortion alleged by the FBI affidavit and other documents associated with his arrest and prosecution. The source says that the FBI was suddenly ordered by the U.S. Attorney's Office--and I believe that order came from the top, ie., U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald and Justice Department officials in Washington--to hold off on doing anything until after the...

The 47-year-old U.S. District Attorney dropped many a memorable sound byte when he unveiled corruption charges against Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich on Tuesday, referring to the governor's actions as a "political corruption crime spree" that brought the state's notoriously crooked politics to a "truly new low" and "would make Lincoln roll over in his grave." The rhetoric, called "priggish" by some, is not surprising for a guy who has built his career fighting Mob bosses, terrorists, drug lords and double-dealing public servants like former Bush aide "Scooter" Libby. "It has become a cliché to compare him to Eliot Ness, the...

As the federal probe into Gov. Rod Blagojevich intensified in recent weeks, editors and reporters at the Chicago Tribune balanced a competitive story with a rare request from U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald's office: To hold off on what they uncovered until a key phase in the investigation could be carried out . . . Since October, the Tribune has broken several stories on the Blagojevich probe, but in some cases withheld information because of the government's request.

Axe ripped Fitzgerald’s patronage purge By: Kenneth P. Vogel December 9, 2008 07:08 PM EST Patrick Fitzgerald’s charges against Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich have drawn a chorus of shock and outrage. But Barack Obama’s message man David Axelrod once staked out a much more nuanced position on Fitzgerald’s anti-corruption crusade. In a 2005 op-ed, Axelrod argued, in effect, that trading political favors – including jobs – is part of the grease that makes government work. He ripped Fitzgerald at the time for trying “to use the criminal code to enforce (his) vision” of “entirely remov(ing) politics from government.” The piece...

CHICAGO – Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was arrested today on charges that accuse him of trying to benefit from his ability to appoint President-elect Barack Obama's replacement in the U.S. Senate. The U.S. Attorney in Chicago says ...the corruption charges represent "a truly new low." An FBI says the 51-year-old Democrat was intercepted conspiring to sell or trade the vacant Senate seat for personal benefits for himself and his wife.