Justice E-Mails on Lam Show Frustrations

Former U.S. Attorney Carol Lam testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee, on Capitol Hill in Washington in this March 6, 2007 file photo. ( AP Photo/Dennis Cook, File) (Dennis Cook - AP)

WASHINGTON -- In the year before her dismissal as San Diego's U.S. attorney, Carol Lam's Justice Department bosses griped about her in snide e-mails and strategized about putting her "on a very short leash."

Yet they gave no explanation when they finally kicked her out in December, Lam testified last month.

The e-mails, among more than 3,000 pages of documents released this week by the House Judiciary Committee, suggest officials grew frustrated by a prosecutor who had her own priorities and views.

In one exchange last July, a Justice Department official wrote that he was sad a top agency official was leaving. That official, Bill Mercer, wrote back suggesting other reasons for sadness.

"That Carol Lam can't meet a deadline," Mercer wrote, "or that you'll need to interact with her in the coming weeks or that she won't just say, 'O.K. You got me. You're right, I've ignored national priorities and obvious local needs. Shoot, my production is more hideous than I realized.'"

Lam took over the San Diego office in 2002 with plans to raise the bar on immigration prosecutions to focus resources on violent criminals and repeat offenders _ goals that put her at odds with political objectives inside and outside the Justice Department.

Justice Department officials have cited her record on immigration and gun prosecutions as a reason for letting her go. Democrats including California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a member of the Judiciary Committee, are convinced there's more to it than that.

Lam won a bribery conviction from GOP Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham in 2005, and when she was fired she was prosecuting an ongoing corruption case, focused on Republicans, that grew from his plea.

This past May 10 Lam notified the Justice Department she'd be issuing search warrants for contractor Brent Wilkes and former CIA No. 3 Kyle "Dusty" Foggo.

The next day, Justice Department chief of staff Kyle Sampson, who resigned this month, wrote an e-mail to the White House counsel's office asking to discuss "the real problem we have right now with Carol Lam that leads me to conclude that we should have someone ready to be nominated on 11/18, the day her 4-year term expires."

Democrats want to question Bush adviser Karl Rove and other top administration aides under oath, and the Judiciary Committee chairman and top Republican have asked Sampson to appear voluntarily on Thursday. Feinstein plans to seek answers on ties between Lam's firing and the Cunningham case.

"I'd like to ask whether there is a connection, and on Thursday I will have an opportunity to ask that question and you can be sure it will be asked," Feinstein told reporters Friday. She said she has been considering summoning career prosecutors from Lam's office to talk to Congress.