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Law Enforcement & Legal 2024-04-25 2026-10-15
Person
PROMIS
DoJ
Lawyer
INSLAW
SpecialCounsel
FederalJudge
Nicholas J. Bua
Nicholas Bua
Nicholas John Bua
Judge Bua
Judge Nicholas J. Bua
Federal judge appointed Special Counsel in the INSLAW matter in November 1991, whose March 1993 report found no credible evidence of a conspiracy to steal PROMIS.
type with reverse start role fn
appointed Jimmy Carter true 1977-07-19 Judge, United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois 1
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appointed William Barr true 1991-11-07 Special Counsel for the INSLAW matter 5
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employed_by Burke, Weaver & Prell 1991 Private practice after leaving the bench 3
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employed_by Holland & Knight 2000 Of counsel 3
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investigated Earl Brian 1991-11-07 1993-03 Allegation of a conspiracy with DOJ to steal PROMIS 2
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investigated Michael Riconosciuto 1991-11-07 1993-03 Principal source for the PROMIS conspiracy allegations 23
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investigated Ari Ben-Menashe 1991-11-07 1993-03 Affidavits alleging international distribution of PROMIS 37
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investigated Cornelius Blackshear 1991-11-07 1993-03 Recantation of deposition testimony in the Independent Handling proceeding 69
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investigated Danny Casolaro 1991-11-07 1993-03 Review of the West Virginia investigation of Casolaro's death 82
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reported_to Janet Reno 1993-03 Report of Special Counsel delivered to the Attorney General 11

Nicholas John Bua (February 9, 1925 to November 1, 2002) was a judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois from 1977 to 1991. In November 1991 Attorney General William Barr appointed him Special Counsel for the PROMIS Software Scandal, and his report to Attorney General Janet Reno in March 1993 found no credible evidence that Department of Justice employees conspired to steal the PROMIS software from INSLAW.12

Early career

Bua was born in Chicago. He served in the United States Army as an infantryman in World War II and took his J.D. from DePaul University College of Law in 1953 on the G.I. Bill.3 He practiced privately in Chicago from 1953 to 1963. He was presiding judge of the Melrose Park, Illinois Village Court in 1963, an associate judge of the Circuit Court of Cook County from 1964 to 1971, and a judge of that court from 1971 to 1976. From 1976 to 1977 he sat on the Illinois Appellate Court, First District; the Chicago Tribune recorded that his 1976 election drew a total of 1,139,183 votes in Cook County.13

Jimmy Carter nominated him on July 19, 1977, to a seat on the Northern District of Illinois vacated by William J. Lynch. The Senate confirmed him on October 7, 1977, and his commission issued October 11, 1977. On September 10, 1980, Carter nominated him to the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit; the Senate took no vote.1 In the district court he was assigned the suit brought by the attorney Michael Shakman against patronage hiring by the Chicago Democratic organization; he entered a summary judgment in 1979 that the city's patronage practices violated civil and voting rights and a consent judgment in 1983 that blocked the city and county from hiring most employees for political reasons.3

His federal service ended on November 4, 1991, by retirement.1 He joined the law firm of Burke, Weaver & Prell and in 2000 became of counsel at Holland & Knight.3 The Federal Judicial Center gives his death as November 1, 2002, in Melrose Park, Illinois.1 The Chicago Tribune reported that he died of leukemia that day at Gottlieb Memorial Hospital in Melrose Park, at age 77, and quoted Chief Judge Charles P. Kocoras of the Northern District of Illinois: "Our court has never had a better colleague."34

Appointment and scope

The report's introduction states that Barr appointed Bua on November 7, 1991, to investigate "all allegations of wrongdoing in connection with" the INSLAW matter. The Attorney General asked for "a complete and thorough investigation" to determine whether any individual inside or outside the Department had engaged in misconduct. Bua wrote that the Attorney General told him the investigation should be completely independent and assured him that he would demand complete cooperation from all DOJ employees. Bua selected six Assistant United States Attorneys, all with significant criminal prosecution experience, and one of his law partners, and the team chose two FBI Special Agents as investigators. The Assistant United States Attorneys and the Federal Bureau of Investigation agents reported solely to him and to no one else within the Department. One of the original six left the staff on appointment as Chief of the Public Integrity Section of the Criminal Division, and Thomas M. Durkin, the former First Assistant United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, left in February 1993 to enter private practice.5 The report characterizes the allegations as ranging "from charges of murder and international espionage to claims of simple incompetence." Bua's team subpoenaed several third-party witnesses before a grand jury in the Northern District of Illinois, and passages of the published text are omitted under Rule 6(e) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure.6

The report distinguishes two kinds of INSLAW allegation: the theory that the contract disputes were driven by the personal bias of the project manager C. Madison Brewer, who had been fired years earlier by INSLAW's president Bill Hamilton, and the theory of a wider conspiracy to appropriate the software for the benefit of Earl Brian, a businessman alleged to have ties to officials of the Ronald Reagan administration.7

The House Committee on the Judiciary gave the appointment date as November 13, 1991, and wrote that at that time the Attorney General had not empowered Bua to subpoena witnesses, convene a grand jury or compel the Department to produce key documents. After a meeting on January 28, 1992, Barr granted him that authority, including the power to subpoena witnesses and convene special grand juries. The committee wrote that INSLAW officials feared that a Special Counsel without independent counsel status would be unable to draw Department employees forward, and quoted Deputy Assistant Attorney General Roger M. Cooper in an interview with Government Computer News: "The judge (Bua) will do as the attorney general wants him to do, and that's fine. I think all of us in the department would like to get it [the INSLAW matter] behind us. It's sort of an albatross."8

Bua told INSLAW's counsel, Elliot Richardson, in a letter of July 7, 1992, that he had decided to "retain my own expert to conduct the examination necessary to compare the software." That examination concerned the claim that the FOIMS system used by the FBI was derived from PROMIS.9

The report's title page lists Helene B. Greenwald, Joseph H. Hartzler, Charles D. Knight, Dean J. Polales and David S. Rosenbloom alongside Bua.10 In March 1993 Bua and his staff submitted the report, the product of a sixteen-month investigation, to the newly appointed Attorney General, Janet Reno.11

The report's findings

The report's summary of conclusions opens with the central finding: "There is no credible evidence to support the allegation that members of DOJ conspired with Earl Brian to obtain or distribute PROMIS software. The overwhelming weight of the evidence is that there was absolutely no connection between Earl Brian and anything related to Inslaw or PROMIS software."2 The report found "woefully insufficient evidence" that DOJ obtained an enhanced version of PROMIS "through fraud, trickery, and deceit," or that DOJ wrongfully distributed PROMIS inside or outside the Department. It stated that DOJ employees acted on what "they genuinely believed were in the best legitimate interests of the government," and that DOJ conducted itself properly after it became involved in litigation with Inslaw.2

On the bankruptcy questions the report found "no credible evidence that DOJ employees sought to improperly influence the selection process that resulted in the decision not to reappoint Bankruptcy Judge George Francis Bason, Jr.." It found insufficient evidence that DOJ employees tried to influence the United States Trustee to convert the Inslaw case or committed perjury to hide such an effort. It found no evidence that DOJ employees destroyed Inslaw documents or obstructed Congressional inquiries.12

The conclusions section restates the finding in compact form: "there is no credible evidence to support either the allegation that there was a scheme to defraud Inslaw, or the allegation that DOJ employees conspired with Earl Brian to steal Inslaw's software." The authors wrote that they were "convinced that these employees genuinely believed that they were acting within DOJ's rights under the contract." They wrote that they did not share Bason's view of Brewer "as a man consumed with hatred and out to destroy Inslaw," and that the "ever-expanding allegations of widespread criminal conduct" were not supported by "credible evidence."13 The report counted at least five formal investigations of the claim of a DOJ conspiracy to steal PROMIS for the benefit of Brian (the Office of Professional Responsibility, the Criminal Division, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, the House Judiciary Committee and Bua's own), and wrote: "Not one investigation has concluded that such a conspiracy existed." It added that William Hamilton's statements and assertions "do not withstand scrutiny" and that witnesses "in a very credible way" denied making statements he attributed to them, and it found "no basis for initiating any criminal charges or disciplinary action against any past or present DOJ employees."14

The implementation contract

The report's historical account treats part of the dispute as settled by concession. Old PROMIS, the 1979 Pilot Project version and the five Bureau of Justice Statistics enhancements were publicly funded, and Inslaw conceded during the bankruptcy litigation that they were in the public domain.15 The 1982 implementation contract was signed on March 12, 1982, and Brewer was hired to oversee installation at the Executive Office for United States Attorneys.16 On January 26, 1983, the contracting officer Peter Videnieks wrote Inslaw that DOJ considered its April 1982 line of credit at the Bank of Bethesda a violation of the contract's assignment prohibition, a letter that led to the advance payments dispute.17

In 1983 Inslaw submitted a methodology for demonstrating which of its enhancements were privately funded. On June 10, 1983, Videnieks wrote that the methodology was unacceptable and that as to Inslaw's request for approval or revisions, "[t]he Government is in a position to do neither." Videnieks and Jack Rugh, Brewer's deputy, had considered proposing an acceptable methodology and decided to reject Inslaw's and say nothing more; Rugh told the investigators he believed Inslaw did not keep sufficient records to support any methodology. The report wrote that this was "not a response we would have recommended" and that it would have been preferable for DOJ to articulate its reasons, and it found no evidence that Videnieks and Rugh acted in bad faith with the intent to obtain Inslaw's property.1819

The conspiracy allegation

The report describes the conspiracy claim as the most serious allegation. Inslaw alleged that high-level DOJ employees, including Attorney General Edwin Meese, conspired with Brian to steal Inslaw's software and destroy the company, to benefit Hadron, Inc., in which Brian had a direct and indirect financial interest. The theory originated in an affidavit by William Hamilton, under which DOJ would force Inslaw into liquidation so that Hadron could buy its assets and receive a "massive sweetheart contract." The report notes that the theory "has evolved over time," and that Inslaw later presented witnesses who claimed DOJ employees delivered copies of the software to Brian and Hadron before the bankruptcy as a reward for a covert role in the "October surprise" conspiracy.20 The report describes Brian as a physician by training and a combat surgeon in Vietnam War, later on the faculty of the University of Southern California and California's Secretary of Health and Welfare under Governor Reagan in the early 1970s, who founded an investment company called Biotech Capital Corporation, later Infotechnology, Inc.; Brian and Biotech both owned Hadron stock in the early 1980s.20 It records that the House October Surprise Task Force and the Senate Special Counsel on the 1980 hostage allegations had each found no credible evidence that members of the 1980 Reagan campaign negotiated to delay the release of the American hostages in Iran.20

The report noted that the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations staff had concluded in September 1989 that it could find "no proof of any connection between Brian or Hadron and the Department with regard to the INSLAW contract." It quoted the House committee's 1992 report as calling the Brian allegations "intriguing . . . but without the requisite degree of causation and factual convergence necessary to draw conclusions at this time into potential wrongdoing in the Inslaw matter," and wrote that the House committee had not provided its evidentiary material to Bua's team. Bua's team reviewed the evidence independently and sorted Inslaw's evidence into "direct proof" from witnesses who claimed personal knowledge of Brian's role and "indirect proof" from witnesses who did not claim such knowledge.21

The report's Hadron section states that there is "no credible evidence that Hadron ever tried to acquire Inslaw or PROMIS," apart from Hamilton's claim about a conversation with Dominic Laiti and related claims that Jonathan Ben Cnaan had relayed.22

Riconosciuto and the Cabazon venture

Michael Riconosciuto was the report's principal source for the PROMIS conspiracy claims. The report states that he "can fairly be described as the key witness against Brian." It identified four occasions on which Riconosciuto had made statements about Inslaw and PROMIS that could be established with accuracy: three under oath and transcribed, and one recorded in notes made by William Hamilton.23 His March 21, 1991, affidavit described a 1981 to 1984 role as Director of Research for a joint venture between Wackenhut Corporation and the Cabazon Indian Reservation near Indio, California.24 The report found that Riconosciuto was in fact in Indio during the early 1980s, that he worked with Dr. John Philip Nichols and the Cabazons, and that the Cabazons entered into a joint venture with Wackenhut. "That is where the truth in Riconosciuto's story stops."25

The report describes Nichols as a non-Indian tribal administrator who managed the tribe's business affairs. It records that Cabazon Security Corporation, formed in early 1981, solicited capabilities statements from security firms. Robert Frye, then president of Wackenhut Services, responded for Wackenhut, and in April 1981 signed the joint venture agreement with Arthur Welmas, the tribal chairman, signing for the Cabazon side. The agreement stated a primary purpose of qualifying for, bidding on and obtaining government guard service contracts; the venture bid on two and won neither. Nichols wanted the venture to sell night vision goggles and rifle scopes to foreign governments, and Wackenhut's files showed efforts to market them to representatives of the governments of Guatemala and Honduras. The report records that Nichols took the view that the Cabazons, as a sovereign nation, were not subject to the usual export and import controls, that Wackenhut personnel wrote internal memoranda that sales would need State Department approval, and that no sales were made. The report states that the firms Riconosciuto described in a call to the Hamiltons, Wackenhut Research, Inc. and Wackenhut Security, Inc., do not exist.26

The Cabazons were introduced to combustible cartridge casing work by Peter Zokosky, former president of Armtec Defense Products, who became an advisor to Nichols and the venture. Zokosky first met Riconosciuto in July 1981 at Nichols's office in Indio. Zokosky and others from the joint venture travelled to Picatinny Arsenal to meet Dr. Harry Fair and an Army project officer, R. Scott Westley, whom Zokosky knew from his time at Armtec, to discuss establishing a second-source combustible cartridge production facility on the Cabazon reservation. Frye recalled first meeting Riconosciuto on a trip to the Arsenal in May 1981; Zokosky recalled that Frye met Riconosciuto on a second trip in October 1981.27 The report states that neither Nichols nor Zokosky was an employee of the joint venture, which had no employees, and that it found no evidence supporting Riconosciuto's claim that he and Brian were employed by Wackenhut or the joint venture.28

Welmas and his wife told investigators that they never saw or met Earl Brian at the reservation and never heard the name mentioned by Nichols, Riconosciuto or others. Sam Cross, the Indio police chief during those years, said that he had been in the mobile trailer behind the Cabazon casino, that there was never any computer equipment in it, and that he never heard the name Earl Brian. Frye and Zokosky both said they never saw Riconosciuto conducting computer operations.29

The report reconstructs a September 10, 1981, weapons demonstration at the Lake Cahuilla gun range in Indio, held to test night vision equipment. The House committee had been aware of a Riverside, California, police report that named Brian among 16 people present. The report states that Bua's team located the document, a four-page "Special Operations Report" titled "Nicaraguans and Earl Brian at Lake Cahuilla - 9/10/81," carrying a typing date of "10/10/91," ten years after the event.30 It was prepared by Gene Gilbert, an investigator for the Riverside County District Attorney's Office, after he interviewed Riconosciuto in jail in 1991 about an unsolved 1981 murder in Indio; the report states that everything in it except the license plate numbers and registrations, which came from the former Indio police officer Dave Baird, came from Riconosciuto.31 Gilbert later produced a second report saying that Baird had identified Brian from a photograph. Baird told investigators that the photograph was a poor-quality photocopy from a magazine and that the most he could say was that the person had the same general physical characteristics as the occupant of Wayne Reeder's Rolls-Royce. Baird's handwritten registration notes referred only to Reeder.32 Zokosky, Nichols and Welmas, who were present, said Brian was not there, and Westley, whom Riconosciuto had placed there, denied attending.33

The report also addresses Riconosciuto's prosecution. "We are convinced beyond all doubt that there was absolutely no connection between Riconosciuto's prosecution and his allegations in the Inslaw matter," the report stated. It described a case that began as a Washington State drug investigation, in which the Drug Enforcement Administration recorded Riconosciuto delivering methamphetamine on videotape.34 The report records that Riconosciuto, with two others, filed a lawsuit challenging the authority of the investigation, alleging among other things that Bua was involved in organized crime murders and that one of the FBI agents assigned to the case had murdered the journalist Danny Casolaro, and that Bua's staff had threatened to kill him; the report states that the district court dismissed the suit, Riconosciuto v. Bua, No. 92 C 6217 (N.D. Ill.), as patently frivolous.35

In its conclusion on Riconosciuto, the report found him "a totally unreliable witness in connection with the allegations he has made about the alleged theft of PROMIS software." It wrote that his account "reminds us of a historical novel; a tale of total fiction woven against the background of accurate historical facts." The report found "no credible witness who could confirm" his claims of CIA work, a radio detonator used in Chile, handling of October Surprise payments, or persuading organized crime members associated with Tony Accardo not to commit a murder.36

Ben-Menashe and Eitan

Ari Ben-Menashe signed two affidavits for Inslaw. The first, dated February 17, 1991, claimed that he attended a 1987 meeting of the Israel Defense Forces External Relations Department at which Brian presented PROMIS, stated that Brian said he owned the rights to PROMIS and had allowed the CIA, the NSA, DOJ and the "Israeli intelligence communities" to use it since 1982, and stated that in 1989 in Chile Carlos Cardoen told him that Cardoen had brokered a sale of PROMIS by Brian to a representative of Iraqi Military Intelligence. The second, dated March 21, 1991, described a December 1982 meeting in the Tel Aviv office of Rafael Eitan, who in the affidavit said that he had received PROMIS from Brian and Robert McFarlane for limited use by an Israeli signals intelligence unit.37

The report cites the House October Surprise Task Force's examination of Ben-Menashe's allegations. According to the Task Force as quoted in the report, Ben-Menashe worked for the External Relations Department of Israeli Military Intelligence between 1977 and 1987 "as a translator of materials of relative insignificance and low levels of classification," and the Task Force described his testimony as "a total fabrication." The Israeli government examined Eitan at the Task Force's request, and according to the Task Force Eitan stated that he did not know Ben-Menashe, had never met him, and heard of him only after Ben-Menashe began making his allegations in 1991.38 Brian, under oath, and McFarlane, in a telephone interview, told Bua's investigators that they "strenuously denied" the entirety of the allegations.39

The report said the investigation of the claimed international distribution of PROMIS "has not proceeded past the preliminary stages. We do not believe that it needs to." It added: "We were not disposed to conduct an international search of foreign governments and intelligence operatives on the basis of Ben-Menashe's allegations."3840 The report noted that Ben-Menashe's story places a PROMIS transfer to Israel in or before December 1982, while DOJ held only public domain versions. Inslaw did not deliver an allegedly enhanced version until April 1983.4041

The report concluded that Ben-Menashe's story was "too incredible to rest on so small a foundation," and it wrote: "We have good reason to doubt the word of a man who implies that he allowed the use of his plainly misleading affidavits in order to promote his book's sale." It concluded that Ben-Menashe "offers no support for the allegation that DOJ and Earl Brian conspired to steal and distribute the software in which Inslaw claims proprietary rights."41

Hayes and the NSA database

The report notes that the National Security Agency informed Bua's team that it used a commercial off-the-shelf package purchased from Computer Corporation of America and that, in 1974 and 1975, six years before Inslaw was incorporated, it had developed a database in the M204 language called PROMIS, an acronym for "Product Related on-line Management Information System." The NSA said its database had no relationship to Inslaw's PROMIS, which was written in COBOL, and that the shared name was coincidental; its General Counsel's office said many personnel knew of the NSA system and had moved to other agencies and private employers.42

The report's section on Charles Hayes, a Kentucky salvage dealer whom William Hamilton contacted after Hayes's disputes with DOJ were reported in the press, is largely omitted under Rule 6(e); it states that Hayes made a variety of allegations about distribution of Inslaw's enhanced PROMIS to Hamilton and to House committee investigators.43 In the later Court of Federal Claims proceedings Hamilton said of Hayes: "I said they took him seriously enough that they brought him to Chicago to testify before the Grand Jury, and everything he said is deleted from the [Bua] report."44

Hadron and the circumstantial claims

The report examined the claim that 53rd Street Ventures and its principals linked Brian to Inslaw. William Hamilton's affidavit attributed to Richard D'Amore of Hambro International Equity Partners, whose firm invested approximately $400,000 in Inslaw in 1983 as lead investor and placed him on Inslaw's board, a statement that Patricia Cloherty had told him she "knew all about" Brian's role in the INSLAW matter. D'Amore told investigators that Cloherty never made such a statement to him and that he never told Hamilton or anyone else that she did. Cloherty, who worked at Patricof and Company from about 1970 until her appointment by President Carter as Deputy Administrator of the Small Business Administration in about 1977, then ran Tessler & Cloherty with her husband Daniel Tessler and returned to Patricof in February 1988, likewise denied saying so. Tessler told investigators that he did not know Brian, Edwin Meese, Laiti or Lowell Jensen, and that to his knowledge his wife had no knowledge of Brian. Cloherty said she did know Brian, whom she met in the 1980s on the board of the National Association of Small Business Investment Companies, and that in 1990 Brian contacted Patricof and Company with a proposal concerning United Press International, which the firm did not pursue; she said she did not know Laiti, Meese or Jensen.45

The Hadron section also examines the claimed Videnieks and Hadron connection, the Accumenics contract award, and a claimed purchase attempt by SCT.46

Jensen, Richard and the Criminal Division

The report examined claims from a confidential source who spoke to Ronald LeGrand, then chief investigator of the Senate Judiciary Committee. As set out in a December 1989 affidavit by Hamilton, the source, described as a senior career official in DOJ, said that the "INSLAW case was a lot dirtier for the Department of Justice than Watergate was," and that Jensen "engineered INSLAW's problems right from the start," relying principally on three senior officials, Miles Matthews, James Knapp and James Johnston. The source named John Keeney, Mark M. Richard and Philip White as knowing "all about" Jensen's conduct. LeGrand told Bua's team that he would relay his source's information but not disclose the source's identity.47

Lowell Jensen, by then a federal district judge in San Francisco, denied that he had engineered any contract dispute with Inslaw or directed any DOJ action to hurt the company. He said he might once have met Brian in Sacramento in the 1970s and denied any involvement with Brian during or after his DOJ service. He denied any financial interest in any company controlled by Brian, including Biotech, Hadron, Accumenics and Simeon, and denied any involvement in awarding contracts for Project Eagle, a program to automate the DOJ litigating divisions whose request for proposals issued in May 1986, the month before his appointment to the bench.48 Matthews said he never stated or thought that Jensen wanted to get Inslaw "out of the way" and give the business to friends; Knapp and Johnston denied knowledge of or participation in any such scheme; and Keeney, Richard and White each told investigators he had no knowledge of wrongdoing by Jensen.49

Bason's reappointment and Lamberth

George Bason, a bankruptcy judge, ruled from the bench on September 28, 1987, that DOJ had taken PROMIS by trickery, fraud and deceit. A merit selection panel of the district court, chaired by Norma H. Johnson, considered his reappointment. The panel's members were invited in the first week of August 1987, just as the testimony in the Inslaw case before Bason was concluding. The report states that there was no suggestion that the timing was other than coincidence.50

The report states that Johnson initially recalled that one of the district judges had recommended she obtain a copy of Bason's ruling. Johnson later identified the judge as Royce Lamberth, whom the report spells "Lambreth." On September 28, 1987, Lamberth was Chief of the Civil Division of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia, and the report states that he was confirmed for the federal bench on November 13, 1987, and sworn in on November 16, 1987.5152 After Johnson contacted Lamberth at the investigators' request she recalled that he handed her a copy of the transcript and said something to the effect of "You ought to see this"; Lamberth could not recall whether he delivered the transcript or referred her to it.53 According to the report, Lamberth brought the ruling to Johnson's attention because he wanted to avoid "blindsiding" the other judges and expected to join the court and make known his opposition to Bason's reappointment; he erroneously believed that district judges would make the selection. He had also asked the Assistant U.S. Attorney Patricia Froman for her views of Bason, and she told him the government would be better off if Bason were not reappointed.54

Johnson circulated the ruling to the panel, and according to three panel members the panel found nothing untoward about it. The panel held a hearing on November 11, 1987, at which sixteen lawyers appeared, among them Inslaw's attorney Charles Work; DOJ declined to appear.5556 The report concluded: "we find nothing untoward in the fact that Royce Lambreth brought that ruling to the attention of Judge Johnson." It also wrote that Lamberth "had every reason to try to influence the selection process to select a bankruptcy judge in whom he had confidence," that such an approach by a government attorney was proper, and that his conduct "bespeaks restraint, not a campaign to unseat Bason in retaliation for the Inslaw ruling."57 The report states that Johnson told the Senate subcommittee that she had no contacts with DOJ regarding Bason and received no negative input from DOJ on the Inslaw case, and that so far as the investigators could tell she told the House committee the same.58

The former bankruptcy judge Roger Whelan had commented negatively about Bason to the panel. The report said it did not mean to suggest that Whelan "singlehandedly derailed" Bason's reappointment, and recorded that Inslaw's attorney Charles Docter reported to the House committee that in July 1987 Whelan threatened to oppose Bason's reappointment because Bason had not ruled on a fee petition Whelan had filed in the UPI case.59

Other individuals named in the report

Lois Battistoni told investigators that a DOJ attorney had told her Hadron was connected to a DOJ official through a California relationship with Meese. She also said that Floyd Bankson told her in 1989 that DOJ intended to "bury Inslaw." Bankson denied the statements attributed to him. Garnett Taylor and Charles Trombetta were the other sources Battistoni named.60

Anthony Moscato, then Acting Director of the Executive Office for United States Attorneys, told investigators that he "had nothing whatsoever to do with the selection of bankruptcy judges." Hamilton had written that Taylor, a former DOJ security officer, knew that Moscato played an affirmative role in the denial of Bason's reappointment; Hamilton did not identify the "senior U.S. Government official" who was the source and said the source declined to permit disclosure of his name, and the Hamiltons, through their attorney, declined to meet Bua's team, preferring to deal directly with the new Attorney General. Moscato said he did not know Johnson, did not know a merit selection panel existed, and was not even a social friend of Taylor.61

Blackshear and Pasciuto

Thomas Stanton, director of the Executive Office for U.S. Trustees, was alleged to have pressured the U.S. Trustee William White to convert the Inslaw case from chapter 11 to chapter 7 and to have considered detailing the Assistant U.S. Trustee Harry Jones to Washington for that purpose. The allegation arose from a private conversation between the Hamiltons and Anthony Pasciuto, then Deputy Director of the Executive Office for U.S. Trustees, on March 17, 1987.6263 The report examines the allegation, the Videnieks notes of a February 1985 conversation with Rugh, and the proposal to detail Jones.646566

Cornelius Blackshear, then a U.S. Trustee and later a bankruptcy judge in the Southern District of New York, was deposed by Inslaw's attorneys on March 25, 1987, and swore that White had called him and said that Stanton wanted the Inslaw case converted and wanted a particular attorney from Blackshear's office assigned to handle it. The House committee reported that the New York judge Jane Solomon told its investigators that on March 18, 1987, Blackshear gave her an identical account, and that Pasciuto swore to committee investigators that Blackshear described Stanton's attempt to pressure him at a January 1987 luncheon attended by the Second Circuit judge Lawrence Pierce; the report states that Blackshear and Pierce do not remember anything being said about Inslaw at that meeting.62636768

Blackshear then submitted an affidavit recanting that testimony and asserting that he had mistaken the Inslaw case for the UPI case. The report records the sequence: White, deposed shortly before Blackshear, had testified that Stanton exerted no pressure; when White learned that Blackshear had testified differently, White telephoned him and told him he was mistaken; Blackshear says that after the conversation he realized he had confused Inslaw with the UPI case; and he prepared and signed the recanting affidavit with the assistance of his attorney, an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Civil Division of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York. He repeated the new account in a second deposition and to the Office of Professional Responsibility.69 The House committee dated the affidavit March 26, 1987.63 Inslaw alleged that DOJ procured a perjurious recantation to cover up its plot to liquidate Inslaw.70

The report identifies the attorney as James Garrity, then an Assistant U.S. Attorney, later a bankruptcy judge in the Southern District of New York, who accompanied Blackshear to his first deposition. The next day Garrity received a call from the DOJ attorney Dean Cooper, the trial attorney defending the Independent Handling claims. Cooper told Garrity that he believed Blackshear's testimony was wrong and that DOJ was concerned that something should be done to correct the error, and did not suggest what the corrected testimony would be. Garrity then spoke to Blackshear, who also said his testimony was wrong; Garrity and Blackshear prepared the recantation affidavit, and Garrity sent a copy to Cooper.71 The report wrote that these facts indicated conduct consistent with the good faith effort expected of attorneys. The House committee wrote that "it is highly questionable how the Department could ethically represent both itself and Judge Blackshear in the INSLAW litigation," because one of its attorneys, Garrity, was at the same time representing a key witness for the plaintiff.63

Bason, in the bankruptcy court, accepted "as true Judge Blackshear's original testimony" and held "that his recantation is the result of an honest mistake on his part." In January 1991 Bason filed a complaint with the Judicial Council of the Second Circuit stating that he had "regretfully concluded" that Blackshear recanted "not because of an honest mistake but because he made a conscious choice to testify falsely."7273 DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility, in a report of March 31, 1989, concluded that Bason's findings were "clearly erroneous" and credited Blackshear's recantation for a variety of reasons.74

Blackshear gave the House committee investigators a sworn statement on January 25, 1991, that the information in his earlier depositions was not based on personal knowledge but on hearsay, much of it from Pasciuto, and that he had never discussed the conversion issue with White. The House committee headed this part of its report "Judge Blackshear's statement to committee lacks credibility." Blackshear told the committee investigators: "My mind changed after having talked to Bill White," and said of the choice between his account and White's: "it would become a credibility question." The report records that on January 16, 1991, he gave Bua's team a document titled "Response of the Hon. Cornelius Blackshear Re Inslaw" stating that he believed it reflected his best recollection, and that he continued to maintain that White told him the IRS had pressured White to move to convert the UPI case. He disagreed with White about a conversation concerning the assignment of Harry Jones to Washington. He also denied Pasciuto's account of a conversation in which Blackshear allegedly admitted that he had given false testimony in his recantation to avoid hurting people.6375

The report assessed the matter in its own terms. It wrote that Blackshear's pre-deposition statements and first deposition "do provide some support for Inslaw's allegations" but were not based on direct personal knowledge, that "[t]his series of contradictory statements can only be described as troubling," and wrote: "At best, it reveals a rather malleable witness who has difficulty recalling certain conversations and events. At worst, it shows a lack of truthfulness on at least one occasion." It attributed the confusion to poor memory rather than intentional misstatement, wrote that if Blackshear was lying there was insufficient evidence to determine on which occasion, and that "there simply is not sufficient evidence to prove (by any standard) that Blackshear lied when he recanted his deposition testimony."76 It added that the recantations of Pasciuto and Blackshear "do not convince us that there is any reason to credit their original testimony," and that "their recantations convince us that we cannot rely upon any of their testimony to resolve this issue."77 The House committee had criticized DOJ for seeking Pasciuto's dismissal while not prosecuting Blackshear for perjury; the report replied that Blackshear "has always maintained that at the time he made the statements in his first deposition, he believed them to be true."78

Pasciuto had admitted under oath in the Independent Handling proceeding that he may have exaggerated or falsified what he told the Hamiltons in order to hurt Stanton. The Office of Professional Responsibility recommended in December 1987 that his employment be terminated, and after that recommendation Pasciuto stated that his statements to the Hamiltons were true. Inslaw alleged that he was fired for whistleblowing; the report found DOJ's conduct in seeking his termination "entirely appropriate."747980

Gregory McKain's testimony concerns a conversation on or about February 21, 1985, shortly after Inslaw had filed for protection under the Bankruptcy Code. The report discusses his testimony among the pieces of circumstantial evidence for the conversion theory and wrote that it "provides some support to the conversion theory, but not enough to satisfy us that the theory is true."81 Rugh and Videnieks rejected Inslaw's proposed methodology for the proprietary-cost submissions in 1983 without offering an alternative, and the report found no evidence of bad faith in that decision.19

Casolaro's death

Danny Casolaro, a self-styled free-lance author and investigative reporter, investigated Inslaw's claims. The report describes his interest in what he called "the Octopus," a supposed secret intelligence organization with links to international arms dealing, covert operations and perhaps organized crime. His body was found in the bathroom of his hotel room at the Sheraton Inn in Martinsburg, West Virginia on August 10, 1991; he died in the bathtub, both wrists slashed several times with a razor blade, and local authorities ruled his death a suicide.82

The report found "nothing unusual" in DOJ's decision not to investigate a private citizen's death, which it described as a state or local matter. It found no evidence of federal government influence on the local investigation. "[T]he physical evidence in Casolaro's hotel room strongly supports the conclusion of the local authorities that the death was a suicide." That evidence included no sign of forced entry or struggle, a note found in the room, and the absence of footprints or other evidence that others were present when the wrists were slashed.83 The tests and analyses cited were handwriting analysis confirming that Casolaro wrote the note; fingerprint analysis finding his prints and no others except a single print on an ash tray; hair and fiber analysis; a blood analysis by Dr. Lee of the Connecticut State Police Forensic Science Laboratory consistent with suicide; and an autopsy that found hemorrhage from the wrist wounds as the cause of death and no evidence that he was unconscious or debilitated when cut.84

The report stated, as the fifth of its points, that "there was ample reason to believe Casolaro had a motive to commit suicide." It noted that he had been unemployed for months, was dependent on financial assistance from his family, faced a balloon mortgage on his home, and had been told shortly before his death by a prospective publisher that it would not advance him any money on his proposed book about the "Octopus."85 The report also noted that James E. Starrs, a professor of law and forensic sciences at George Washington University, reportedly reached the same opinion in an independent review of the autopsy.86 It addressed criticisms that the room was not sealed, that notification of next of kin was delayed while the body was embalmed, and that Martinsburg authorities gave insufficient weight to suspicions about Casolaro's "sources," and stated that "no credible evidence suggested that any of Casolaro's 'sources' played any role in his death."87

House Judiciary Committee report, 1992

The House Committee on the Judiciary issued "The INSLAW Affair" as House Report 102-857 on September 10, 1992, under Chairman Jack Brooks.88 The committee's report described the Department's handling of the matter in terms that stand against the Bua report's conclusions. It wrote that Attorneys General Meese and Dick Thornburgh "blocked or restricted congressional inquiries into the matter, ignored the findings of two courts and refused to ask for the appointment of an independent counsel."8

The committee wrote that it had "no reason to doubt the commitment of Judge Bua or Attorney General Barr to do a thorough investigation of this matter," but that "as long as the investigation of wrongdoing by former and current high level Justice officials remains under the control of the Department, there will always be serious doubt about the objectivity and thoroughness of the work." The committee's position was that "the only way the INSLAW allegations can be adequately and fully investigated is by the appointment of an independent counsel," and that the independent counsel should investigate all matters related to the allegations, "including Mr. Casolaro's death and its possible link to individuals associated with organized crime."8 On Casolaro, the committee wrote that it had not included the death in its formal investigation, that local authorities had ruled it a suicide a second time on January 25, 1992, after more than 1,000 man-hours, and that the controversy continued to be discussed in the press and the Martinsburg Police Department's investigation had been criticized.89

DOJ review, September 1994

Reno ordered a senior-level Justice Department review of Bua's report and of INSLAW's analysis of it, including INSLAW's July 12, 1993, "Analysis and Rebuttal of the Bua Report" and its February 14, 1994, Addendum. The review was issued on September 27, 1994, with the Bua report attached as Addendum A.90 Its summary recommended that the Attorney General "adopt the Special Counsel's report in its entirety," along with specified conclusions that the review described as "fully supported by the available evidence."91

The review restated that there was no credible evidence of a conspiracy with anyone to steal PROMIS or to injure Inslaw. It found no credible evidence that the Office of Special Investigations was engaged in covert intelligence activities, in illegal trafficking of PROMIS software, or in the death of Casolaro. It stated that the Martinsburg conclusion that Casolaro's death was a suicide "is fully supported by the facts surrounding his death," and that there was "no credible evidence that Mr. Casolaro was murdered."91 The review devoted pp. 107 to 168 to Casolaro's death, covering the death scene, hotel employees, coroner, embalming, notification of next of kin, autopsy, further police investigation and the review's own interviews.92

The review found "no basis for the appointment of an independent prosecutor" and recommended against waiving statutory time bars on INSLAW's monetary claims. It recommended that the Attorney General "take those steps necessary to bring this entire affair to closure from the Department's perspective," and wrote that the Special Counsel concluded, and the review concurred, that virtually all of the allegations "were based on nothing more than uncorroborated conjecture, on hearsay information from anonymous sources or on information received from patently unreliable sources."93

On the Johnson contact, the review wrote that Johnson had at first failed to recall the contact with Lamberth. It stated that Lamberth had already been nominated to the federal bench when he was sworn in on November 16, 1987, and it concurred "with the opinion of the Special Counsel that there is no evidence of any effort by the Justice Department to improperly influence the bankruptcy judge selection process."94

On May 3, 1995, by S. Res. 114, the Senate referred S. 740, a bill for the relief of INSLAW, to the Chief Judge of the Court of Federal Claims as Congressional Reference No. 95-338X, and Hearing Officer Christine Odell Cook Miller described the two Justice Department inquiries as the "Bua and Dwyer investigations": Bua's investigation on behalf of Barr, and a second investigation, in response to INSLAW's criticisms of Bua's report, that Reno asked the Assistant Associate Attorney General to undertake.44 Miller's report of July 31, 1997, was reviewed by a panel of the court, whose report is dated May 11, 1998.95

Footnotes

  1. Federal Judicial Center. "Bua, Nicholas John." Biographical Directory of Article III Federal Judges. https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/bua-nicholas-john ↩︎

  2. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 13. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  3. "Nicholas J. Bua, 77." Chicago Tribune, November 2, 2002. https://www.chicagotribune.com/2002/11/02/nicholas-j-bua-77/ ↩︎

  4. "Bua, Hon. Nicholas J." Paid death notice, Chicago Tribune, November 2, 2002. https://www.chicagotribune.com/2002/11/02/bua-hon-nicholas-j-2/ ↩︎

  5. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 1. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  6. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 2. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  7. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 3. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  8. U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary. The INSLAW Affair. H. Rept. 102-857, 102d Cong., 2d sess., September 10, 1992, pp. 109-110, Part IX, Conclusion. ↩︎

  9. U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary. The INSLAW Affair. H. Rept. 102-857, 102d Cong., 2d sess., September 10, 1992, pp. 59-61, Part IV.B.6. ↩︎

  10. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, title page. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  11. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of the United States Department of Justice on the Review of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua's Report on the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. September 27, 1994, pp. 2 and 4. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  12. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 13-14. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  13. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 264-265. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  14. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 266-267. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  15. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 15-21, IV. The Development of Inslaw's Claimed Proprietary Software. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  16. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 20. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  17. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 25, D. The Advance Payments Dispute. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  18. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 33-34. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  19. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 138-139. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  20. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 39. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  21. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 40-41. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  22. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 122. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  23. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 42. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  24. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 44, (ii) Riconosciuto's March 21, 1991 Affidavit. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  25. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 54. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  26. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 55-56, (i) The Wackenhut-Cabazon Joint Venture. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  27. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 57-58. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  28. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 58. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  29. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 59. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  30. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 61. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  31. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 62. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  32. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 63-65. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  33. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 65. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  34. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 67. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  35. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 69. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  36. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 72. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  37. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 73-74. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  38. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 79. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  39. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 79-80. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  40. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 151. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  41. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 81. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  42. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 80-81. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  43. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 81-82. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  44. U.S. Court of Federal Claims. INSLAW, Inc. v. United States, Cong. Ref. No. 95-338X, Report of the Hearing Officer (Miller, J.), July 31, 1997, 39 Fed. Cl. 307. https://static.case.law/fed-cl/39/cases/0307-01.json ↩︎

  45. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 92-96. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  46. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 97-106. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  47. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 113-114. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  48. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 118-119. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  49. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 119-120. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  50. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 156. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  51. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 157. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  52. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 161. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  53. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 160. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  54. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 161-162. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  55. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 162-163. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  56. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 167-168. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  57. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 163-165. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  58. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 166. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  59. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 166-169. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  60. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 106-112, 9. The Lois Battistoni Allegations. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  61. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 186-187. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  62. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 192. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  63. U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary. The INSLAW Affair. H. Rept. 102-857, 102d Cong., 2d sess., September 10, 1992, pp. 73-77, Part V. ↩︎

  64. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 204. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  65. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 211. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  66. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 224-228. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  67. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 215. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  68. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 209. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  69. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 215-217. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  70. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 194. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  71. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 229-230. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  72. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 195-196. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  73. U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary. The INSLAW Affair. H. Rept. 102-857, 102d Cong., 2d sess., September 10, 1992, p. 78, Part V.D. ↩︎

  74. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 197. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  75. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 217-219. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  76. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 221-223. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  77. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 229. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  78. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 210. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  79. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 209-210. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  80. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 230-231. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  81. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 211-214. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  82. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 246. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  83. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 247. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  84. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 247-248. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  85. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, p. 248. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  86. U.S. Department of Justice, Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc., March 1993, p. 126 note 4, naming "Professor James E. Starrs, a noted forensic pathology expert at the George Washington University law school" (citing Washington Business Journal, November 9-15, 1992, p. 13); the conclusion at pp. 248-250 prints the surname as "Starr." https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  87. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of Inslaw, Inc. March 1993, pp. 249-250. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  88. U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary. The INSLAW Affair. H. Rept. 102-857, 102d Cong., 2d sess., September 10, 1992, title page. ↩︎

  89. U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary. The INSLAW Affair. H. Rept. 102-857, 102d Cong., 2d sess., September 10, 1992, pp. 69-72, Part IV.C.1. ↩︎

  90. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of the United States Department of Justice on the Review of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua's Report on the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. September 27, 1994, pp. 1-4. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  91. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of the United States Department of Justice on the Review of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua's Report on the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. September 27, 1994, pp. 7-9, III. Summary of Conclusions and Recommendations. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  92. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of the United States Department of Justice on the Review of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua's Report on the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. September 27, 1994, pp. 107-168, V. The Weight of the Evidence Indicates That J. Daniel Casolaro Committed Suicide. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  93. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of the United States Department of Justice on the Review of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua's Report on the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. September 27, 1994, pp. 9-10, III. Summary of Conclusions and Recommendations. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  94. U.S. Department of Justice. Report of the United States Department of Justice on the Review of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua's Report on the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. September 27, 1994, pp. 101-102. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

  95. U.S. Court of Federal Claims. INSLAW, Inc. v. United States, No. 95-338X, Report of the Review Panel, May 11, 1998, 40 Fed. Cl. 843. https://static.case.law/fed-cl/40/cases/0843-01.json ↩︎