As a card carrying member of the bar, I have to say it is about time that American lawyers learned something from their feisty compatriots in Pakistan. Sure enough, they have done exactly that. From the LA Times:
In an attempt to win sanctions against a former top Bush administration official over brutal interrogations of prisoners at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib, a lawyers group deployed a strategy Monday that worked against Presidents Nixon and Clinton.
Former Defense Department General Counsel William J. Haynes II is the first of several former policymakers the National Lawyers Guild wants reprimanded, suspended or disbarred for their roles in detainee abuse, said Carlos Villarreal, executive director of the San Francisco Bay Area guild chapter that filed a complaint against Haynes with the State Bar of California.
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A similar complaint is being prepared in Pennsylvania against former Justice Department lawyer John C. Yoo, the UC Berkeley law professor who is currently a visiting professor at Chapman University School of Law in Orange, for his role in drafting the legal guidelines that approved enhanced interrogation techniques including waterboarding.
Would the National Lawyers Guild have only been so aggressive earlier, but, hey, better late than never. And it may have some effect as it is coming just before the DOJ Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) is on the verge of releasing what looks to be a scathing report on just this conduct from the Bush/Cheney Administration.
It has now been exactly a month since the Washington Post related the following:
Senate Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin (Ill.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.) are demanding an update on the probe by the department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, which for more than a year has been examining whether the lawyers who prepared the memos followed professional standards.
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Two sources briefed on a draft of the report said there is a strong likelihood that its findings will be shared with state legal disciplinary authorities, who could launch their own investigation into whether the lawyers who prepared the memos abided by their professional responsibilities.
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Matthew Miller, a spokesman for new Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., said that "the matter is under review" but declined to comment further yesterday about whether Holder would endorse the investigators’ conclusions.
So, Attorney General Holder, let’s have the report and let’s have it now.