Oy did I wake up pissed off this morning.

But then I read John Pacenti's tremendous column today and learned that former prosecutor Sean Cronin, who got into such hot water for his shockingly poor judgment during the Ali Shaygan trial before Judge Gold (now on appeal), is actually working on Gitmo cases!?!?!

Thanks John, now I feel a whole lot better.

Here's Senor Calli on this pickle of a predicament:

“I was surprised to learn that there would be an appeal of that order with a professed view from the Department of Justice in Washington to hold prosecutors accountable,” he said. “Judge Gold is one of the finest district court judges in the country. He went to great pains at the sanctions hearing to protect the due process rights of these prosecutors and law enforcement agents and gave them every opportunity to explain themselves.”

Calli said Gold, along with many federal jurists around the country, is concerned that prosecutors are not being held accountable by their department.

“I think whether it’s in Alaska or Florida or in Boston, you are seeing district judges police their own courtroom,” he said.

Ahh yes, accountability --a wonderful concept that should in all cases be applied strictly to others.

Angry commuter Joe DeMaria chimes in:

“Government seems to be blind to the message Judge Gold was sending,” DeMaria said. “I’m concerned when a senior government prosecutor seeking the position of U.S. attorney is being defensive about it. Whether it’s sanctionable or not, the conduct was not defensible.”

Defensive? Lack of accountability?

You want to talk defensive and unaccountable conduct, consider the Dark One's appearance on Fox News Sunday:

“We ask these people to do some very difficult things,” Mr. Cheney said. “They do so at the direction of the president.”

Interesting choice of words, "difficult."

In what sense is it "difficult" for the perpetrator to have to torture someone "at the direction of the President"?

Hmm, this reminds me of a discussion we had recently on Rump's blog.

You mean it's "difficult" for the torturer in that sometimes this person is called on by the state to be ruthless, to be cold-blooded, to be merciless in committing what some might from the outside view as cruel, inhumane or even immoral acts -- to compartmentalize and justify these actions because they are being done for the greater good, for the nation, for total Victory, and for Our Fearless Leader?

Nope, good thing modern Western Civilization has never encountered that impulse before.

The inestimable Julie Kay breaks news as usual regarding the shameful effort by prosecutors in Alex Acosta's office to trap uber-lawyer David O. Markus, which resulted in an explosive $600k sanctions order by Judge Gold:

The three prosecutors themselves are appealing. Josefsberg and Pearson filed a notice of appeal for Hoffman, and Martinez and colleagues Maureen Lefebvre and Susan Tarbe filed a motion on behalf of Cronin.

Martinez said he will argue that Cronin and the others were wrongly denied the opportunity to speak at the hearing when they were sanctioned.

“They were excluded and didn’t have the opportunity to put on their case,” he said. “Just as [defense attorney David O.] Markus wants due process rights, we feel Mr. Cronin is entitled to his due process rights. It is appropriate for him to be heard by the judge.”

Gilbert has not yet filed a notice of appeal. Becerra, who moved to Greenberg from the U.S. attorney’s office, has taken the case pro bono, according to her secretary. Becerra is out of the office on parental leave.

When asked whether Martinez, a former Miami U.S. attorney, was representing him pro bono, Cronin said, “I’d rather not answer that.”

Oh man, that's rich -- was Sean so flustered by Julie's question that all he could do was say "I'd rather not answer" -- thereby answering by not answering? Was he not prepared to handle that inquiry? What's the big deal about going pro bono in the first place? (Note -- corrected, thx).

BTW, I love that these prosecutors are now pleading for due process -- which of course they deserve -- when it was apparent from the sanctions order that due process was not exactly at the top of their trial to-do list.

Also, didn't Cronin testify (lamely) for several hours before Judge Gold anyways? As the Judge repeatedly told him, "tell the truth, Mr. Cronin."

Plus, even my buddy Paul Calli gets quoted!

And, in a surprise move, so does Kendall Coffey.

Walter and Donald, sing this one out please.....

I usually read Herald editorials purely for their comic and/or sleep-inducing values.

So I was a bit surprised to see one today about our own federal blogger uber-lawyer:

U.S. District Judge Alan Gold used that term, ''win at all costs,'' to describe the egregious misconduct of three U.S. prosecutors in an exhaustive 50-page reprimand last week. The judge was justifiably outraged by the way prosecutors Sean Cronin, Karen Gilbert and Andrea Hoffman handled a narcotics case against a Miami Beach doctor.

The prosecutors conducted a secret investigation of the defendant's attorneys, using informers to try to entrap them into bribery. They taped the defense attorneys' conversations, but all they got was lawyers saying No to the informers' invitations to commit bribery.

Becoming vengeful

The prosecutors then used their informers as witnesses in the trial, asserting that they were impartial and neutral, which could hardly be the case since they had tried to help set up the defense team. The prosecutors neglected to tell the judge or their boss, the U.S. attorney, about their extra-curricular venture. When the defense team wasn't cooperative enough, the prosecutors became vengeful. They increased the original 26 charges to 141.

None of this worked. A witness revealed the bribery entrapment scheme on the stand. The defense used this to argue that the prosecutors had a weak case. The jury agreed, and the defendant was found not guilty on all counts.

Now Judge Gold has ordered the U.S. attorney's office to pay the former defendant, Ali Shaygan, $600,000 as a fine for the prosecutors' bad behavior. The fine will reimburse Dr. Shaygan for his legal fees.

(psst, wake up little SFL, you have been dreaming again of Diora Baird as an Orion in the new Star Trek movie.....)

Sheesh, could you write any more boring? These guys could make reporting on the Normandy invasion seem like a snoozefest.

And thanks John Pacenti for finally covering the Tom Tew story we wrote about six days ago.

Don't worry, it's ok that you didn't mention this crappy blog for breaking that story -- I do it all for love, my peoples.

Huge and well-deserved victory for our own David O. Markus as Judge Gold drops a bomb on Alex Acosta's office:

The judge reprimanded the two trial prosecutors, saying that along with Drug Enforcement Administration agent Christopher Wells, they “acted vexatiously and in bad faith” in prosecuting Dr. Ali Shaygan. Also reprimanded was assistant U.S. Attorney Karen Gilbert, the narcotics section chief.

Gold called the secret taping of phone calls to Shaygan’s attorney and defense investigator by two informants was “profoundly disturbing.” He raised the specter of the recent dismissal of a conviction against former U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, because prosecutors in that case withheld key evidence.

The $601,795 covers court fees and lawyer costs dating from a superseding indictment filed by prosecutors in September.

“The order speaks for itself. We regret that any of this ever happened in the first place but we are grateful that Judge Gold took it seriously and did the right thing,” said Miami criminal defense attorney David O. Markus, the lead counsel for Shaygan. “Thank goodness that the conduct did not distract the jury from finding Dr. Shaygan not guilty of all 141 counts against him.

Miami attorneys Marc Seitles and Robin Kaplan served as co-counsels for the defense.

You can read the order here.

Alex has other not-so-great coverage in the DBR here.

I previously covered Alex's alleged supervision of rogue Christian Bradley Schlozman and his unsolicited intervention in the Ohio election process.

His defense on that -- that I was just informing those poor black voters about their legal rights -- is particularly lame.

I like Alex. He doesn't strike me as aggressively ideological, and his office is filled with many talented attorneys who take their charge as public servants seriously. And of course he is not solely responsible for this Judge Gold order.

But as I say about Frankie boy and 9th Circuit torture judge Jay Bybee, this stuff kinda matters.

It's easy to have integrity and to be highly ethical when you are not particularly pressed by a superior or government to do something possibly dubious or questionable. That's 98 percent of your life.

It's what you do in the other 2 percent that matters.

And that doesn't mean people don't make mistakes sometimes and can't ever do the right thing again. They do and can.

But if you are in denial mode about the original questionable action it is hard to move past it and for others to have confidence in your judgment in the future.

Boy oh boy what a disaster is unfolding in Judge Gold's courtroom, in the aftermath of the acquital of Dr. Ali Shaygan by uber-trial mensch David O. Markus:

U.S. District Judge Alan S. Gold, who held two days of hearings this week on the matter, said there were "flagrant violations" of basic rules by prosecutors and indicated he would likely order the U.S. government to pay the defense lawyers thousands of dollars in fees and costs.

"It's more than just mistakes. Important safeguards were not met," Gold said. "It doesn't seem like any facts were verified."

U.S. Attorney R. Alexander Acosta on Wednesday called the situation "regrettable" and said the allegations have been referred to the U.S. Justice Department for possible disciplinary action.

The misconduct claims arose earlier this month during the trial of Dr. Ali Shaygan, 36, who was accused in a 141-count indictment of writing illegal prescriptions including one that led to a patient's death from a methadone overdose. Shaygan, acquitted last week of all charges, had faced a minimum of 20 years in prison because of that person's death.

During the trial, Shaygan attorney David O. Markus found out by chance during questioning of a witness that his prior telephone conversation with that witness had been recorded. It later turned out that prosecutors authorized two witnesses - Carlos Vento and Trinity Clendening - to secretly record their phone calls with Markus and his investigator, Michael Graff.

At least one witness seemed to ask Markus to pay a bribe for testimony, according to the recordings. But Markus wouldn't go along.

"I am not paying any money for anything," the attorney said in one recording, according to a transcript.

In addition, Vento and Clendening had agreed to become confidential informants for the Drug Enforcement Administration - a critical fact never disclosed to the defense. Such information is important in criminal trials because a jury could otherwise never learn that the witnesses might have a bias in favor of prosecutors.

Of course David did the right thing -- no one would expect anything different. Can the same be said of the other actors involved in this tawdry drama?

David, always so serious.

Now me, if I had suspected the feds were recording me without my knowledge, I would have sang old Dr. Demento songs, Tom Lehrer, probably would have done a little Allan Sherman, you know, the classics.....hey my singing voice is quite good.