A federal appeals court on Wednesday refused to block the release of anindependent investigative report on prosecutorial misconduct during the trial of the late Sen. Ted Stevens. The decision means the report will be publicly released on Thursday, as scheduled.
U.S. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan has said the report by Henry F. Schuelke “chronicles significant prosecutorial misconduct in a highly publicized investigation and prosecution brought by the Public Integrity Section against an incumbent United States Senator.”
Stevens, who died in a 2010 plane crash, was convicted of lying on his disclosure forms back in 2008 but Attorney General Eric Holder had the charges tossed in 2009 over problems with prosecutors handing over evidence to the defense team. One of the members of DOJ’s prosecution team committed suicide in 2010 and friends told TPM he felt “scapegoated” by the Department.
