In Vegas, attorney firing is an outrage

LAS VEGAS — When Daniel G. Bogden was named by President Bush to be the U.S. attorney for Nevada, it was the culmination of a career dream for a man steeped in public law -- he had worked as a judge advocate general for the Air Force, a deputy district attorney in Reno and chief of the U.S. attorney's branch office in Reno.

But his five-year tenure came to what Bogden describes as a "sudden, shocking" end in December, when he took a phone call from Michael A. Battle, director of the executive office of U.S. attorneys, and was told, " 'We want to move the office in another direction,' " Bogden recalls.

One theory is that the new direction might have taken the federal prosecutor's office away from a corruption probe into newly elected Republican Gov. Jim Gibbons' financial dealings with a federal contractor.

It is also possible, as suggested by one internal Justice Department e-mail, that Bogden was canned for not pursuing obscenity cases more vigorously.

Or maybe, as another e-mail released last week suggested, there was no good reason.

The reasons for the abrupt dismissal remain a mystery, but it has sparked wide outrage in Las Vegas, with public officials and private attorneys alike rising to Bogden's defense, saying the man had done an excellent job and was wrongfully dismissed.

"I was flabbergasted when I heard this," said Sen. John Ensign, the powerful Republican who recommended Bogden, 51, a declared political independent, for the post.

Ensign said that the matter was "completely mishandled" by the Bush administration and that "a very good man has been wronged."

As Congress intensifies its probe into the administration's abrupt firings of eight U.S. attorneys, the Las Vegas case is very much front and center, with Ensign emerging as perhaps the most fierce Republican critic of Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales in the matter.

Ensign has pressured Justice Dept. officials to find Bogden a new position.

The reasons for Bogden's firing remain something of a potboiler here, though one internal Bush administration memo suggests some dissatisfaction in Washington that Bogden's office had not pursued obscenity cases vigorously enough.

While Nevada is not exactly short on potential obscenity cases, no one here seems to know what cases the Justice Department may have been discussing, and officials there have declined to elaborate.