Minnesota U.S. Attorney's Office Revisited

There has been a lot of back and forth of the Internet and elsewhere about whether or not new U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey will keep on U.S. Attorney Rachel Paulose or give her walking papers. There are certainly some in her office -- and a number of partisan blogs -- lobbying for the latter. And indeed, it wouldnt shock me if that happened. Most politicians do the easiest thing , and lets face it, its much easier to throw something away and get a new one rather than to try to salvage it. We do live in a throw-away culture, after all. But personally I am loath to do that with human beings unless we have to.

My opinion of the situation of the situation at the Minnesota U.S. Attorneys Office has not significantly changed since last April, when I wrote a column expressing my views on it. At that time I pointed out that while Paulose appeared to be highly intelligent and hard-working 34-year-old woman with a sterling educational and legal background for her age, she was an inexperienced manager who made some managerial missteps due to that inexperience. Those mistakes occurred in a tinderbox environment because the people she was managing included career prosecutors with significantly more age and seasoning. As a result, she definitely suffered some growing pains, or, as former assistant U.S. attorney Hank Shea recently put it, had a baptism by fire.

Paulose does seem to be learning, reportedly delegating a lot more and promoting awareness of her office by doing outreach work on the road. The complaints I see circulating in the blogosphere trace back to events six months or more. (There are, of course, a number of matters under investigation in the office, and those matters no doubt will continue to be looked into.)

I have no idea what Mukasey will ultimately decide to do about the situation at the Minnesota office. Hopefully, he will examine the facts closely and weigh all the options before rushing to a decision. Personally, I would like to see him continue to give Paulose get a chance to show that she has learned something from her experiences. If nothing else, you have to admire her pluckiness for even wanting that chance after the battering she has taken in the media and on the Internet. I can't quite decide if she is highly committed or just plain masochistic.

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[Source: Minnesota Lawyer Blog]