Has the cronyism been cleaned up in the Office of Justice Program?

Written by Biloxi
October 20, 2008

Last month, I had written an article about the House subcommittee's hearing on the Office of Justice Programs (OJP) where now Assistant Attorney General for that department, Jeffrey Sedgwick, testified to the subcommittee that there will be a transparency in the grant decision making process. I have continued to follow the on-going investigation in the Office of Juvenile Justice Department of Prevention (OJJDP) under OJJDP Administrator J. Robert Flores. There hasn't been any indication to when the House committee and the Senate committee will re-start the probing in this manner. I went back to look at the Oversight Committee hearing on Mr. Flores to former Assistant Attorney General Regina Schofield.

Ms. Schofield said that Mr. Flores “misrepresented the rating scores” of bidders for the National Juvenile Justice Programs last year and hid the fact that most of his choices received lower scores than many of the proposals that he rejected. She couldn’t give a defense for Mr. .Flores since Ms. Schofield approved the grants. The reason is why did Ms. Schofield throw Mr. Flores under the bus? Well, after researching Ms. Schofield's bio and career in the Bush Administration, she, too, is no stranger to cronyism.

Ms. Schofield was confirmed as Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Justice Programs on June 8, 2005. Prior to that position, she was the Director of Intergovernmental Affairs and White House Liaison at the Department of Health and Human Services.Schofield, who doesn't have a law degree, was confirmed by Senate. Why did President Bush picked a non-attorney to be his new Attorney General? Senator Patrick Leahy had some reservation of Bush's nominee.

Senator Leahy said in the Senate confirmation hearing on Schofield:

"I am interested to learn how Ms. Schofield will approach this job. I will be interested in learning her experience with law enforcement. She comes to DOJ from HHS and a brief stint at the United States Postal Service. Her lack of justice experience stands in stark contrast to the relevant prior experience of both Laurie O. Robinson, President’s Clinton’s AAG for OJP, who had been Director of the American Bar Association's (ABA's) Criminal Justice Section for 14 years at the time of her nomination, and Deborah Daniels, President’s Bush’s first AAG for OJP, who was an experienced prosecutor with prior DOJ experience at the time of her nomination."

One of the cronyism that Schofield was connected to was the Bush Administration's politicization of the Surgeon General Richard H. Carmona. Mr. Carmona accused the Administration of blocking him from speaking out on certain public health issues such as "embryonic stem cell research, global climate change, emergency contraception, and abstinence-only education." According to Carmona's testimony before a House committee in July 2007, he routinely battled with Bush appointees who try to suppress his reports on global health and other politically sensitive topics in order to achieve political goals. Schofield was the White House Liaison at the Department of Health and Human Services at that time. In a Sept. 25, 2002 e-mail to Ms. Schofield, William Turenne, a former Eli Lilly executive who served as a high-level consultant at Department of Health Services, described Mr. Carmona as "wandering" and "not focused on the president's/secretary's agenda."

Another cronyism that was connected to Schofield was the internal Justice Department audit revealing extravagant travel and banquet expenses: [Read more]. In September 14, 2007, an internal Justice Department audit revealed that the department had sent employees to 10 conferences over the last two years, with unusually high expenses, including "$4.04 per serving of Swedish meatballs at a dinner." Ms. Schofield's department approved 6 of the 10 conferences. What was interesting was that Ms. Schofield announced her resignation on September 13, 2007 -- just one day prior to the audit release.

This is just another example of incompetent employees put into a position for a political agenda. But, it leaves a lot to desire to Ms. Schofield's truthfulness to her story on J. Robert Flores when she herself got her hands caught in the cookie jar of graft. Mr. Flores said in his testimony:

"In 2007, unlike prior years, OJJDP had a discretionary funding line. Decisions on what to fund and how to do it are shared between the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Justice Programs (OJP), who has final authority on grants, and the OJJDP Administrator who, based on experience and expertise, makes recommendations within his discretion on what to fund as defined by the JJDPA and Department rules."

So, who is telling the truth here? Better yet, why are both faulting the other? Certainly, Ms. Schofeld didn't want any focus in Mr. Flores' probe on her as the former Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Justice Programs and the internal DOJ probe into excessive business expenses probe in 2007.

The Office of Justice Program is simply putting a Band-Aid on the entire division. Flores was never reprimanded for his grant decision making process in the OJJDP probe from the OJP nor the Attorney General. Still, the broken system within the Juvenile Justice program is broken. There is still no word from the Inspector General's investigation into Mr. Flores illegal hiring of a former Honduran General Hector Rene Fonseca. Mr. Fonseca, a non US citizen in 2004 when hired, did not meet the residence requirement of living in the US. Mr. Flores. Fonseca was paid $450 a day as a contractor to work on faith-based and gang issues. Someone needs to put a bug into the Inspector General's ear on the status of this probe.