Harry Jaffe: Pershing Park case resembles Watergate cover-up
By: Harry Jaffe
Examiner Columnist
August 7, 2009
It's not the crime, it's the cover-up that will land you in the slammer -- or force you out of a high-profile job.
Google Richard Nixon and Watergate. What sunk the 37th president was not his scheming and bad-mouthing minorities; not his role in breaking into Democratic offices at the Watergate hotel. It was the attempt to hide his role, cover his tracks, thwart the investigation. That's what led to Nixon's impending impeachment and his resignation.
Google Scooter Libby. I. Lewis "ScooterÓ Libby was former Vice President Dick Cheney's trusted aide and fixer. He became ensnared in the Valerie Plame affair, in which political operatives connected to George W. Bush's White House allegedly broke her CIA cover, in retaliation for her husband's break with the Bush team's rationale for attacking Iraq.
Libby, a respected lawyer and trusted aide, took a felony rap not for outing Plame but for "obstruction of justice.Ó He was convicted of trying to cover up the trail to those who leaked Plame's name.
Bear this in mind as the Pershing Park case unfolds in federal court: It's not the crime, it's the cover-up.
At this point, everyone agrees that D.C. cops wrongfully swept up hundreds of innocent bystanders -- along with a few activists -- when they were trying to control protests against the World Bank and International Monetary Fund in 2002. Rowdy protesters had just wrecked parts of Seattle in their outrage at globalization, directed at the big international lenders. No way then-D.C. Police Chief Chuck Ramsey -- and his assistant Cathy Lanier -- wanted video of rampaging protesters in the U.S. capital broadcast around the globe.
So the police brass ordered the cops to clear the streets, by whatever means necessary, of everyone -- including office workers on lunch break. Ramsey was forced to apologize, and many sued and were paid by the city; 400 are still in court.
This case had dragged on for years. Attorney fees have piled up, claims by aggrieved plaintiffs are stiff, the city has refused to settle, and both sides have dug in their heels. But in digging in its heels, has the city engaged in a massive cover-up?
Crucial evidence is missing: records of police movements, radio recordings, e-mails. "The scope of destruction is extraordinary,Ó the plaintiffs' lawyers wrote.
Federal Judge Emmet Sullivan agreed and threatened to hit the city with sanctions and to start an investigation.
Jonathan Turley is one of the lawyers representing the hundreds of people falsely arrested. A professor at George Washington Law School and media-savvy lawyer, he would love nothing more than to claim a cover-up.
Attorney General Peter Nickles knows that. He has brought in former Judge Stanley Sporkin to comb files in hopes of beating Turley and Sullivan to the missing documents.
But will someone have to get thrown under the cover-up bus?
"Not since Rose Mary Woods has there been a more convenient gap in these tapes,Ó Turley told the judge last week.
Shades of Watergate all over again.
E-mail Harry Jaffe at hjaffe@washingtonexaminer.com.
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