Is a right-wing law professor part of the Bush payola-propaganda scheme, like Armstrong Williams, Maggie Gallagher, Michael McManus, and "Jeff Gannon"?
The Indian Trust lawsuit (Cobell v. Norton) is a class action to force the government to account for billions of dollars held in trust for about a half-million Native Americans and their heirs since the late 19th century. The government has no accurate records of the beneficiaries and the amounts owed them. The Clinton and Bush administrations' record during the case has been beyond contemptible.
Now the plaintiffs are trying to find out if "Let's Drill in ANWR" Professor Richard Pierce Jr. of George Washington University (rpierce@law.gwu.edu, (202) 994-1549) was on the take when he wrote a hit piece and filed a judicial misconduct complaint against the presiding judge, Royce Lamberth, in spring 2004.
From the
National Law Journal:
Pierce leaped into the eight-year-old litigation last spring when he published a law review article entitled, "Judge Lamberth's Reign of Terror at the Department of Interior," criticizing U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth's orders and conduct in Cobell v. Norton, No. 1:96CV01285 (D.D.C.). His article quoted unnamed government lawyers in support of some of his arguments. The article was published in the Administrative Law Review, published by the students of American University Washington College of Law. 56 Admin. L. Rev. 235 (2004).
The law professor attached the article to a judicial misconduct complaint that he filed against Lamberth, whom he accused of defaming and abusing government lawyers in the Cobell case. Lamberth filed a 37-page response; the complaint was dismissed as well as a subsequent appeal by Pierce.
Keith Harper of the Native American Rights Fund, counsel to the Cobell plaintiffs, said the article contained "disingenuous and false" statements.
"There've been numerous critics of Judge Lamberth and our case-professors and others-and we haven't sought to depose a single one," he said. "The reason is: In none of those instances did they seek to undermine the integrity of the judicial process in a collateral proceeding. He put the article in a judicial complaint.
"We have a right to determine to what extent he was doing this at the behest of the Justice Department or others," Harper added. "He said in his article itself that he had all these private conversations. We need to find out what happened and if there was any contractual obligation. In this administration, we have seen a pattern of paying people in the private sector to carry their water."
