This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2010, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
The relationship between state and federal prosecutors handling child Internet crimes was so dysfunctional last year that Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff wrote a scathing letter complaining to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder about the lack of cooperation.
Shurtleff fought for more than a year to keep the letter secret, spending thousands of dollars of taxpayers' money on the effort.
In the letter, the Utah attorney general complains federal prosecutors were cutting lenient deals for child predators, were trying to grab high-profile cases and were mistreating Utah investigators.
"Unfortunately, my office has not had a favorable experience with the United States Attorney's Office the past few years, as a partner in the criminal justice system," Shurtleff wrote. "Rather, the current U.S. attorney has sought headlines and press conferences to promote his own image and has ignored or denigrated other law enforcement and prosecutorial offices.
"Brett Tolman, who resigned as U.S. attorney in January of this year, said he hasn't seen the letter but thought it was a poor way to handle conflicts between law enforcement agencies."
At the time it was written, and even today, I didn't care . . . and I don't know whether or not Mark Shurtleff approved of my performance as U.S. attorney or what we did," Tolman said. "Our goal was not to meet the approval of an individual but to do our job."Tolman said Shurtleff had never requested a meeting to discuss concerns before he sent the letter, although Shurtleff said he raised the issues repeatedly.
The two met later, and Tolman said Shurtleff apologized for the way he had handled the disagreements. Shurtleff said, in the spirit of cooperation, he acknowledged that it would be better to try harder to work through disputes before going to Tolman's boss.
In his letter to Holder, Shurtleff said that Tolman insisted that the U.S. Attorney's Office should handle all of the high-profile cases, leaving Shurtleff's office to handle less important cases, and threatened federal funds if Shurtleff's office didn't comply.Shurtleff also complained to Holder that federal prosecutors were cutting far more lenient plea deals than the state prosecutors ever would, even though federal law provided for harsher penalties.
Tolman said that kind of claim suggests Shurtleff doesn't fully understand the federal system.
"There's not a whole lot of leeway in terms of reducing charges," Tolman said, and sentencing guidelines also offered very little latitude.
"I wasn't in it to run for office, and I wasn't in it to build an image for myself," Tolman said. "I stand behind the job I did." Shurtleff first mentioned the letter in a televised interview last June, and The Salt Lake Tribune requested a copy.
Shurtleff's office refused to release it, arguing it was a private correspondence and its release could damage the working relationship between the two offices.
The State Records Committee ordered its release in September 2009, but the Attorney General's Office appealed to 3rd District Court.Within the past few weeks, the Attorney General's Office agreed to drop its challenge and to pay $5,950 to cover half of The Tribune's legal fees. "
Any time you have any sort of problem or potential problem between what really are the two top law enforcement officers in the state, I think the public should know about it, and I think there's a significant public interest in that disagreement," said Terry Orme, Tribune managing editor.
"I'm at a loss to explain why we had to get into a legal wrestling match over this.
" Shurtleff said he resisted releasing the letter because it is important for law enforcement to be able to communicate privately about issues. "I felt we ought to be able to have communications with the U.S. Attorney General on matters of what we do without having to make that public," Shurtleff said. "We were defending the process. We weren't trying to hide something."
He said after he wrote the letter in March of 2009 he worked through some of the issues with Tolman, and his office has a good working relationship with the current interim U.S. Attorney, Carlie Christensen. Melodie Rydalch, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office, agreed that the two law enforcement offices have worked things out.
"I think that was then, this is now. I think a lot of those issues were resolved between Mister Tolman and Attorney General Shurtleff," she said. "It may have been a snapshot in time that is not the case now."
Mark Shurtleff letter (pdf)