Federal Prosecutors Sanctioned For "Win At Any Cost" Mentality!

April 22, 2009 - PRLog -- In a recent article titled, “Tables Turned on Federal Prosecutors”, Michael Frantz, a Federal Prison Consultant for Jail Time Consulting wrote about a case involving a South Florida physician, Dr. Ali Shaygan, who was allegedly prescribing painkillers like oxycodone to drug addicts and allegedly caused the death of a Palm Beach man. The case involved not the notoriety of Dr. Shaygan, but the alleged prosecutorial misconduct of U.S. Federal Prosecutors Sean Cronin and Andrea Hoffman.  The federal prosecutors had their day in court and the verdict is in!


U.S. District Judge Alan Gold ordered the federal government to pay sanctions in excess of $600,000 for the actions of these two U.S. Federal Prosecutors. Judge Gold in an abrasively worded statement said the “win at any cost behavior” of federal prosecutors Sean Cronin and Andrea Hoffman raised “troubling issues about the integrity of those who wield enormous power over the people they prosecute.” As Michael Frantz previously stated in his initial article about this case, “Illegal acts by government prosecutors and their agents must stop and should be dealt with sternly. Their purported purpose of upholding the law and furthering of justice can hardly be accomplished if they break the very laws they are directed to uphold. Especially, as in this case, if they use fabricated evidence and a fictitious complaint as an excuse to spy on the defense team.”


The sanctions originated with a purported government investigation to look into witness tampering by Dr. Shaygan’s defense team, but resulted in the disclosure of three recordings that were not previously disclosed to Judge Gold or David O. Markus, Marc Seitles, and Robin Kaplan—Dr. Shaygan’s attorneys. These recordings were done by the prosecution and violated internal policies of the U.S. Attorney’s Office and federal evidentiary rules. Federal evidentiary rules and the internal policies of the U.S. Attorney’s Office require that the defense team be informed of the existence of all recordings. Cronin and Hoffman failed to do so.


A spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office admitted that mistakes were made in the case, but asserted that they were not intentional. Michael Frantz contends, Not intentional! How could they not be intentional? The U.S. prosecutors knew the rules, knew the law, and knew their own internal policies, but chose the “win at any cost behavior” mentality that Judge Gold described. Isn’t it time that federal prosecutors be held criminally responsible for their own illegal actions instead of just fining the Federal Government—in this case $600,000. After all, isn’t it the American taxpayers who are really paying the $600,000 sanction? Did Sean Cronin and Andrea Hoffman receive any monetary penalties? Did Sean Cronin and Andrea Hoffman receive and sanctions from the United States Bar Association?  Was either of them put on leave without pay? Without criminal sanctions for violations of the law, U.S. Prosecutors and government officials will continue the “win and any cost behavior”.  U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta initially stated that the matter has been referred to the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility for investigation. It will be interesting to see if any further sanctions come from Sean Cronin and Andrea Hoffman’s illegal acts.  


Michael Frantz also stated, “The federal government and its employees have a responsibility and a solemn trust to uphold the law and not break it. If they violate this solemn trust, stern and uncompromising actions must be taken to remove them from their position of trust and penalize them for their criminal actions.”

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About Jail Time Consulting: Michael Frantz is a leading national Federal Prison Consultant with Jail Time Consulting. He has authored a book on Federal Prison titled, "Jail Time, What you need to know...Before you go to federal prison!" as well as 35 JT Special Reports© on various prison issues affecting both inmates and their families. He writes a daily blog on the JT Consulting website http://jailtimeconsulting.com.

Jail Time Consulting is a Federal Prison Consulting firm providing consulting services, research, sentence reduction techniques, and client positioning for BOP programs. JT Consulting offers solutions to the problems that men and women facing federal prison are confronted with. We work closely with our clients and their attorneys to provide the lowest possible net sentence. We prepare and position our clients for admission to the 500-Hour Residential Drug Abuse Program which offers the inmate a 12 month sentence reduction and a 6 month halfway house designation.