U.S. Attorney William McSwain already revealed himself to be wildly unprofessional and an embarrassment to his office when he used the recent Philadelphia shooting as an opportunity to bash District Attorney Larry Krasner. Now we can add that McSwain is also either completely clueless or beyond disingenuous.
McSwain blamed Krasner for alleged shooter Maurice Hill’s attack in a statement stringing together a barely coherent set of accusations about how not throwing the book at low-level drug crimes resulted in a guy shooting cops. To the extent the missive made a lick of sense, McSwain seemed to be arguing that Hill, a man with multiple prior arrests, was only on the streets and able to commit this crime because Krasner isn’t “tough” on crime.
Thanks to the reporting of the good folks over at The Appeal, we now know that if anyone is to blame for Hill being on the streets it’s… McSwain’s office:
That is indeed the question. We know, from recent and bizarre experience, just how easy it is for someone in the DOJ to look up federal informants. Did McSwain know that Hill was the beneficiary of years of sweetheart deals from McSwain’s own office, or is he so disengaged from the actual business of his office that he didn’t perform even basic due diligence on this guy before unleashing his rant?
Hill’s deals with the feds pre-date McSwain’s tenure, but that’s not much of a defense. When McSwain breached all protocol to try to blame local law enforcement for this attack, he had an opportunity to make sure his people weren’t the ones keeping Hill out there. Just chalk this up as another reason why the DOJ needs to address McSwain’s buffoonery by firing him immediately… for the institution’s own credibility.
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Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.