A series of courtroom setbacks, a rash of high-level defections and the growing influence of Mayor Adrian Fenty’s legal counsel over the District’s legal affairs have some city officials asking, whatever happened to D.C. Attorney General Linda Singer?

Singer, 41, is responsible for a 660-person, $87 million agency that is supposed to defend the city from litigation, enforce its child-support laws, argue for wards of the court and protect consumers.