Former U.S. Attorney Paul Charlton expressed relief that the Justice Department is no longer seek­ing to exe­cute a defen­dant in the case that was cause for his ter­mi­na­tion. Charlton told the Associated Press that he did not think the gov­ern­ment had suf­fi­cient evi­dence to pur­sue the death penal­ty in the pros­e­cu­tion of Jose Rios Rico. Charlton’s boss, for­mer Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, want­ed him to pur­sue it any­way and tes­ti­fied to a Senate pan­el that he fired Charlton over his ​“poor judg­ment” in the case. The present admin­is­tra­tion has reached a plea deal with Rico that takes the death penal­ty off the table. ​“A more sea­soned group of indi­vid­u­als are review­ing these deci­sions now,” Charlton said of the Department of Justice. Charlton also not­ed that the Justice Department resist­ed spend­ing mon­ey to exhume a body in the Rico mat­ter despite the fact that this would like­ly have helped the pros­e­cu­tion’s case.

Charlton was one of the nine U.S. attor­neys who were fired in 2006 in a con­tro­ver­sial move by the Bush admin­is­tra­tion. Congressional inves­ti­ga­tions, an inter­nal Justice Department inquiry, and calls on Capitol Hill for the res­ig­na­tion of Gonzales fol­lowed. Regarding Gonzalez, Charlton said, ​“Attorney General Gonzales and his deputy attor­ney gen­er­al were pri­mar­i­ly con­cerned with the dog­ma and polit­i­cal con­cerns that sur­round the death penal­ty as opposed to what was right.”

(C. Kahn, ​“Former US Attorney relieved with Ariz. Murder case,” Associated Press, September 23, 2008). See Federal Death Penalty and Arbitrariness.

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