God bless Judicial Watch; they do some fantastic work.
Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it has filed a lawsuit against the Department of Justice (DOJ) for failing to respond to its request for public records under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 11-01121)). The documents relate to a decision by the DOJ not to prosecute the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and its cofounder Omar Ahmad, who has been linked by federal investigators to the terrorist group Hamas. The decision not to prosecute reportedly was made over the objections of special agents of the FBI and prosecutors at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Dallas, Texas.
On May 9, 2011, Judicial Watch sent a FOIA request to the DOJ’s Office of Information Policy (OIP) seeking access to the following:
- The March 31, 2010 memorandum entitled “Declination of Prosecution of Omar Ahmad from
Attorney General David Kris to Acting Deputy Attorney General Gary Grindler.- “Any and all communications, contacts, or correspondence between the Office of the Attorney General (AG), the Office of Deputy Attorney General (DAG), or the Office of the Associate Attorney General (Assoc. AG) and the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) or any CAIR groups concerning, regarding, or relating to the prosecution or declination of prosecution of Omar Ahmad.”
- “Any all communications, contacts, or correspondence between the Office of the AG, the Office of the DAG, or the Office of the Assoc. AG and the U.S. Congress concerning, regarding, or relating to the prosecution or declination of prosecution of Omar Ahmad”
- “Any and all communications, contacts, or correspondence between the office of the AG, the office of the DAG, or the office of the Assoc. AG and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Texas concerning, regarding, or relating to the prosecution or declination of prosecution of Omar Ahmad.”
On May 9, 2011, Judicial Watch also filed a similar request with the DOJ’s National Security Division (NSD) seeking access to contacts and correspondence between the NSD and CAIR, Congress, and the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Northern District of Texas regarding the decision not to prosecute. The time frame for these requests is January 20, 2009, to May 1, 2011.