The fate of Karl Rove, Scotter Libby, and other White House officials lies in
the hands of one prosecutor and twelve jurors. The man leading the
investigation, Patrick Fitzgerald, is a man of high standings and quality in the
field of law. Nominated by President Bush on September 19, 2001, he was
unanimously confirmed by Senate 35 days later.
Born in 1961, Fitzgerald graduated from Harvard law in 1985. Since then he
effectively prosecuted the Gambino crime family, and held prosecutions against
suspects involved in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. By 1996 he was serving
on a committee of prosecutors actively investigation Usama bin Laden and
effectively got an indictment handed down.. He went from the to being lead
prosecutor investigating the Africa Embassy bombings in 1998. In 2001 he was
head of questioning against Jamal al-Fadl, an al Qaeda operative. Mr. Fitzgerald
effectively got a description from the terrorist describing his travels to the
Sudan’s terrorist organizations. All these facts indicate why he was considered
one of our nation’s experts on al Qaeda.
In December of 2003, Mr. Fitzgerald was appointed to lead the investigation
into the Valerie Plame leak. He was done so in order to remove John Ashcroft
from the investigation. This highly sensitive case raised concerns about a Bush
friend leading the investigation, especially when it could lead to indictments
of close personal friends.
This sums it up as Patrick Fitzgerald is an extremely competent attorney who
gets the job done. He has been on the Valerie Plame case for 18 months and has
taken it to levels that many never predicted. While right wingers are out there
launching a very harsh smear campaign against Joe Wilson, the fact remains that
Wilson is not the one facing prosecution.
With all the resources and time consumed by this case, it would be shocking
to see it end in October without any indictments. There is a very good man
leading the investigation and I am confident he will find out what truly
happened that summer two years ago!