Jesselyn Radack

Jesselyn Radack (born 1970 or 1971) is a former U.S. Department of Justice ethics adviser who came to prominence as a whistleblower after she objected to the government's treatment of John Walker Lindh (the "American Taliban" captured during the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan), having argued that, since a lawyer had been retained to represent him, he could not be interrogated without that lawyer present.

Biography

Radack was born in Washington, D.C. She attended Brown University, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa her junior year, and graduated magna cum laude as a triple-major with Honors in all three majors. Since 1983, when Brown began tracking such data, only one other student has received honors in three concentrations.

She then attended Yale Law School. After graduation she was selected for the Attorney’s General Honors Program and worked for the Department of Justice from 1995-2002. She is currently the homeland security director of the Government Accountability Project.

Employment at the Department of Justice

Involvement in ethics inquiry concerning the Lindh Case

In December 2001, while working at the Professional Responsibility and Advisory Office (PRAO) of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Radack received an inquiry from a DOJ terrorism prosecutor asking whether the FBI could question Lindh without the presence of counsel, given that Lindh's father had hired a lawyer, James Brosnahan, for him. Radack responded that this was not permitted by law, but she offered an alternative procedure: "[T]he FBI agent can say something to Walker to the effect of: 'We understand that your father has retained counsel for you. Do you want this lawyer to represent you?' Given that Walker's parents think he was brain-washed, maybe he doesn't want a lawyer of their choosing. This option would be more risky, but I wanted to make you aware of it."

The FBI thereafter questioned Lindh without the presence of the lawyer his father had retained. Upon being advised of this, Radack responded, "You just advised that the Deputy Legal Advisor of the FBI stated that an agent went and interviewed Walker over the weekend, not knowing that Walker was a represented person. Please keep me in the loop as you learn more details. The interview may have to be sealed or only used for national security purposes; however, I don't have enough information yet to make that recommendation." Radack continued to research the issue until December 20, 2001, when a supervisor instructed her to drop it, because PRAO was no longer involved in the matter. Radack later stated that, at the time, she "didn't feel strongly enough to make a huge issue of it."

Negative Performance Evaluation

The government filed criminal charges against Lindh on January 15, 2002. On February 4, 2002, Radack received a blistering performance review. It did not mention the Lindh case, but it severely questioned her legal judgment in a variety of matters she had handled.

Radack's supervisor offered to let Radack resign without placing the review in her official file. But, if Radack did not resign, the review would become part of her employment record. Radack felt that she was being forced to leave because of her involvement with the Lindh case.

Missing E-Mails

Lindh eventually retained Mr. Brosnahan to represent him. The defense made a discovery request for information that would support his motion to suppress the statements he had made to the FBI. Radack's supervisor learned of the request in late February 2002, and sent the PRAO's Lindh file to the prosecutors assigned to the Lindh case. On March 7, 2002, one of the prosecutors, Randy Bellows, sent Radack an e-mail stating that he had two of her e-mails regarding Lindh, and was checking to make sure there were no others.

Radack checked the file, but found only three e-mails. She later stated that she felt physically ill. Most of the relevant e-mails were missing, including the one she had sent stating that the FBI agents could not interrogate Lindh outside the attorney's presence.

Radack then retrieved 14 e-mails from her computer and gave them to her supervisor with a cover memorandum. When the supervisor asked Radack why the e-mails were not in the file, Radack replied that she did not know, and her supervisor said, "Now I have to explain why PRAO should not look bad for not turning them over." Radack suspected that DOJ was trying to suppress her e-mails. Her supervisor, however, later blamed Radack, stating that "this was not the first instance in which a [file] handled by Ms. Radack was incomplete or was missing relevant documents." The supervisor sent the missing e-mails to the prosecutor, who later informed her that the court had ruled that the e-mails did not have to be disclosed to the defense.

Unbeknownst to Radack, all of her e-mails, including the ones missing from the file, were turned over to the court presiding over Lindh's case for an in camera inspection on March 1 and 11, 2002. On April 1, 2002, the court issued a protective order prohibiting the disclosure of the e-mails.

After these events, Radack resigned from DOJ on April 5, 2002, and took a job with a private law firm.

Publication of Radack's DOJ E-Mails in Newsweek

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Aftermath

DOJ's Investigation of Radack

Meanwhile, it was the official position of the Department of Justice that it had no knowledge that Lindh was represented by a lawyer prior to his interrogation—a position contradicted by Radack's files. Furthermore, Attorney General John Ashcroft stated that “to our knowledge, (Lindh) has not chosen a lawyer (at the time of interrogation)”. Upon reading about the government's position in an article in Newsweek, Radack faxed her documents to Newsweek.

In June, the District Court ordered the Justice Department to investigate the origins of the e-mails. The Justice Department put Radack under criminal investigation after she declined to speak at length to investigators. Ronald Powell, a special agent for the Justice Department's Office of the Inspector General, informed Radack's new employer of the investigation and questioned its staff and lawyers, and Radack lost her job as a result. U.S. senator Ted Kennedy submitted questions about this affair to Attorney General John Ashcroft in March 2003 and expressed concern about her situation in May 2003. After some time, the criminal investigation was closed with no charges, but her case was referred to the state bar of Maryland, which eventually cleared her of all wrongdoing.

Constitutional scholar and former Associate Deputy Attorney General under Ronald Reagan, Bruce Fein, represented Radack pro bono in her fight against retaliation.

Senator Edward M. Kennedy later said: "It appears she (Radack) was effectively fired for providing legal advice that the (Justice) Department didn't agree with."

Radack's Lawsuit against DOJ

In 2005, Radack sued DOJ, alleging that its Office of Professional Responsibility violated the Privacy Act of 1974 and the Administrative Procedure Act in connection with its referral of professional misconduct allegations to District of Columbia and Maryland Bar officials. The lawsuit was dismissed in 2006.

External links

• Lost in the Jihad, by Jane Mayer, The New Yorker, March 10, 2003, p. 7f.
• Whistleblowing in Washington by Jesselyn Radack, from Reform Judaism Magazine
• The Woman Who Knew Too Much, Brown Alumni Magazine article
• Anatomy of a Whistleblower, article by Laurie Abraham, Mother Jones, January/February 2004
• Whistleblower Charges Justice Dept. with Misconduct - Jesselyn Radack speaks to Democracy Now!, January 13, 2005.
• Her book, The Canary in the Coalmine (2004), recounts her ordeals.
• Jesselyn Radack's account on the blog DailyKos