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I just received an email from a dedicated LFR reader. The email contained a letter that was supposedly sent by Amy Lawler to Minnesota Deputy Attorney General Olson. (While I haven't been able to independently verify the letter's origin, the letter's content is consistent with the accusations made against General Swanson. What I do know is that the person sending me this information has been totally reliable. I've never had reason to doubt the validity of this person's information.) In the letter portion of the pdf file, Ms. Lawler made the following disturbing statement:
I understand that 52 attorneys have left over the last year in an office staffed by approximately 126 attorneys. That is a staggering turnover rate and it is doubtful that a private firm could survive such attrition. Many have wanted to speak up but have been afraid to do so. Those who have advocated for unionization after having been at the office for years are told that they have a political vendetta or were predisposed to attack your tenure as attorney general; those who are new have been told that we have not been in the office long enough to form an opinion, or that our relative youth robs us of the credibility needed to suggest reforms for the office.
Ms. Lawler is right. losing 52 of 126 attorneys is astonishingly high. It isn't possible to operate a business with that attrition rate. (Yes, I meant attrition rate because it's far higher than a turnover rate.)
As distressing as that portion of the letter is, it pales in comparison with this portion of the letter:
The attorney general informed me that she had read newspaper articles about attorneys general in other states filing lawsuits against mortgage foreclosure consultants. She handed me those articles and told me to find some defendants and file a similar lawsuit the following week. Your March 10 letter placing me on leave falsely states that at that time, Attorney General Swanson also provided me with copies of consumer complaints and complaints by other attorneys general. This is simply untrue. In fact, at the time of the meeting, no one in the room knew of any consumer complaints on the issue. I was instructed at the time to procure copies of the other states' complaints on my own. During the meeting, I asked you and the attorney general about how a case could be built so quickly, and you brushed aside my concerns, telling me simply "Don't worry, we'll make it survive a Rule 11." Rule 11, as you know, is the rule of civil procedure allowing for sanctions against attorneys who file frivolous lawsuits. It seemed clear to me from your comment that you understood that it might be difficult to ethically file lawsuits within the proscribed amount of time, and that it was questionable to decide to file a lawsuit before even locating a defendant, but were determined to file it nonetheless.
This is incredibly damning information. If the OLA finds that these charges are legitimate, then Ms. Swanson is in trouble.
I'll make this prediction: once this information gets into Jim Noble's hands, it's safe to say that things will get much worse for Ms. Swanson before things get better.
Comments welcome at LFR. |
