Legal News

Pat Fitzgerald None Too Happy About Forthcoming Book

By Ashby Jones

The All-American, no-nonsense, loved-by-Democrats-and-Republicans-alike U.S. attorney in Chicago, Patrick Fitzgerald, is about the last guy you’d expect to get embroiled in some high-profile media smackdown. But according to reports from the AP and the Chicago Sun-Times, one has already begun.

For now, Fitzgerald hasn’t filed suit. But Fitzgerald doesn’t seem happy about portions of a forthcoming book to be published by HarperCollins which reportedly contains unflattering assertions the way in which Fitzgerald handled terrorism cases when he was an assistant U.S. attorney in New York.

“If HarperCollins publishes the new edition of “Triple Cross” by Peter Lance this month “and it defames me or casts me in a false light, HarperCollins will be sued,” Patrick Fitzgerald said in a letter to the publishing house, according to the AP. (Harper Collins is owned by News Corporation, the parent company of the Wall Street Journal.)

According to the Sun-Times, Lance’s book accuses Fitzgerald and others of discrediting “a treasure trove of al-Qaida-related evidence,” including information of a bin Laden plot to hijack a plane. The book also accuses Fitzgerald of filing a false court affidavit involving terror investigations.

Fitzgerald, who prosecuted the Scooter Libby case, told the AP recently that the book goes beyond garden-variety criticism, which “goes with the territory” for public figures. “This is different,” he said. “The book lied about the facts and alleged that I deliberately misled the courts and the public in ways that in part caused the deaths in the 1998 embassy bombing attacks and in the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.”

Peter Lance, the author, says Fitzgerald’s attacks are off base. “Patrick Fitzgerald accuses me of making charges in the book that I never made,” Lance said. “At the same time, he continually fails to respond to the substantive allegations documented in 604 pages, 1,425 end notes and 32 pages of documentary appendices.”

The new edition with 26 additional pages and an introduction responding to Fitzgerald will be published June 16, Lance said. HarperCollins spokeswoman Erin Crum and publisher Jonathan Burnham were not reached by the Sun-Times.

Fun fact about Fitzgerald: in a previous life he worked as a New York doorman. In 2007, Fitzgerald told NPR’s Peter Sagal that he also worked as a janitor, which he found easier than doormanning. “You just mop the floor and don't have to worry about people being weird,” he said. “Tenants in buildings can be weird.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on June 09, 2009 (boomark / email).