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The appalling and unprofessional manner in which the FBI is dribbling out bits of information to the press in this matter throws into stark relief the words of Justice Robert H. Jackson in his address on the federal prosecutor given in 1940 as highlighted by Bruce Fein's column in today's Washington Times:
The prosecutor has more control over life, liberty and reputation than any other person in America. His discretion is tremendous. He can have citizens investigated and, if he is that kind of person, he can have this done to the tune of public statements and veiled or unveiled intimations. Or the prosecutor may choose a more subtle course and simply have a citizen's friends interviewed. The prosecutor can order arrests, present cases to the grand jury in secret session, and on the basis of his one-sided presentation of the facts, can cause the citizen to be indicted and held for trial. He may dismiss the case before trial, in which case the defense never has a chance to be heard. ... While the prosecutor at his best is one of the most beneficent forces in our society, when he acts from malice or other base motives, he is one of the worst.
Given the staggering disconnect between the 2001-2002 narrative of Iraq as the source of the anthrax and the current one of the late Bruce Ivins as the source of the anthrax, it is absolutely essential that, to the extent genuinely possible, the evidence be publicly laid out. The evidence may show Ivins to be guilty or it may demonstrate the FBI's investigation as the sort of shoddy work product one can expect from a Justice Department that has been retooled into a political arm of the White House.
