Lobbyist, Fed Lawyer Share Vacation Home

A vacation home purchased by former Assistant Attorney General Sue Ellen Wooldridge, former Deputy Secretary J. Steven Griles and ConocoPhillips Vice President Donald R. Duncan in Kiawah Island, S.C., Monday, Feb. 12, 2007 (AP Photo/Alice Keeney) (Alice Keeney - AP)

After she became solicitor, Wooldridge told the department's ethics office she and Griles had begun dating, an Interior spokesman said.

From 2001 through 2004 Duncan was lobbying the department on a wide range of issues. The topics, according to his lobbying records on file with the government, included oil leases in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, coal-bed methane in the San Juan Basin of New Mexico and the Powder River Basin in Wyoming, and permits for the proposed Alaska natural gas pipeline.

After Griles resigned from Interior, Bush appointed Wooldridge to head the Justice Department's 600-employee environment division, representing virtually every federal agency on cases related to pollution, natural resources, wildlife, some Indian issues and land condemnation. She began work at Justice in November 2005. The division is now handling about 6,800 cases nationwide.

Griles, meanwhile, had signed up as lobbying clients the American Petroleum Institute, Newmont Mining Corp. and other energy and mining clients with a broad range of legal and financial interests before the government.

As for the vacation home, Stephen W. Grafman, Wooldridge's attorney, said she paid for her share and was told by the Justice Department's ethics office a month before the sale went through "that the purchase was not a problem."

"There was no need to recuse herself from ConocoPhillips since she was advised by the appropriate ethics officials that there was not a conflict," Grafman said. "Mr. Duncan invested in the property as an individual and friend. He has no business before the environment division. He never lobbied Ms Wooldridge on an issue on behalf of himself. In point of fact, he never lobbied her on behalf of ConocoPhillips."

A Justice Department spokeswoman, Cynthia Magnuson, confirmed that Wooldridge "sought the advice of ethics officials who informed her that the purchase did not raise ethical issues."

Magnuson said the consent decrees with ConocoPhillips "were approved through the normal management channels and were presented to Sue Ellen with the unanimous recommendations of her career staff as well as those of the EPA."

Griles' lawyer, Barry M. Hartman, called the home "a shared investment among people who have been close personal friends for years. What exactly is wrong with three close personal friends sharing a vacation/rental home?"

Wooldridge submitted her resignation letter to the Justice Department on Jan. 8, three days after other prosecutors in the department met with Griles to outline criminal charges they are seeking against him. She said in the letter she wanted to return to work in the private sector.

The federal task force heading the Abramoff corruption probe also has become interested in Wooldridge and her connections to Griles, people familiar with the investigation said on condition of anonymity, citing the issue's sensitivity.

Paul Light, a professor at New York University's Wagner School of Public Service and an expert on presidential appointees, said Wooldridge's participation in the Kiawah Island partnership and the ConocoPhillips settlement "creates the impression of favoritism, or favors due."