U.S. Attorney Acts the Part

John S. Gordon, a career prosecutor known for his work ethic, has been making his mark while serving as temporary head of the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles, the largest outside Washington, D.C.

After taking over 10 months ago, Gordon moved to streamline operations in the 245-lawyer office, where he has spent virtually all of his legal career.

He ordered a review of all unresolved cases three years or older. The result was a dramatic decline in a large backlog.

Gordon also trimmed the number of managers in the U.S. attorney’s office, sending more attorneys into the trenches to prosecute suspected criminals.

“We needed more soldiers and fewer generals,” he explained in a recent interview.

From his 12th-floor suite in the U.S. Courthouse in downtown Los Angeles, Gordon rides herd over the prosecution of federal crimes in a seven-county region with a population of 17 million extending from Orange to San Luis Obispo counties. The office also represents the Justice Department in civil litigation.

The 43-year-old Gordon clearly relishes his job, even though he knows he will have to relinquish the reins when President Bush nominates a full-term successor to former U.S. Atty. Alejandro N. Mayorkas. That might happen any day now.

Mayorkas, a Democrat, stepped down last April as part of a changing of the guard at federal prosecutors’ offices around the nation following the Republican presidential victory in 2000.

Gordon, then serving as head of the criminal division, the No. 3 job in the office, was tapped by Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft to fill in while the new administration looked for a replacement.

Though there has been no official announcement from the White House, Republican sources say the nomination will probably go to Santa Monica Superior Court Judge Debra Yang, a former federal prosecutor who has strong GOP credentials. The nomination requires U.S. Senate confirmation.

Gordon, an independent, initially declared that he was not interested in the job. He changed his mind later and applied.

“But I went nowhere,” he joked. “I don’t think I even got to the second heat.”

Waiting for a new boss to be picked has been unsettling for some prosecutors, but Gordon refuses to be distracted. He is all business, coping with daily crises and making long-range plans intended to outlast his tenure.

After taking over last April, Gordon set out to reduce the backlog of cases that were gathering dust. He ordered a review of all cases three years or older in which no charges had been filed. Prosecutors with aging, unresolved cases had to justify the delays.

“Just by announcing the project, we motivated a lot of people to clear them out because they didn’t want the front office to know they had a number of 3-year-old investigations,” Gordon said.

Some of the 54 cases were taken to trial, some were settled with plea agreements and others were thrown out. Much of the backlog is now gone, Gordon said, adding, “Now, I believe, we’re staying current.”

Some prosecutors grumbled about the review but Gordon is unapologetic.

“I was never in the military, but I probably do run the office in more of a military fashion than my predecessor,” he said. “I don’t believe in mindless discipline, but I do believe in efficiency and I do believe in the chain of command.”

That was borne out in a memorandum that Gordon ordered circulated among the defense bar last year.

Put simply, the message said: Don’t buck the chain of command. If you have a beef with a prosecutor, take it up with his section chief. If that fails, write a letter to the chief of the criminal division and, if that doesn’t help, then write one to the U.S. attorney.

Some of the biggest names in the white-collar criminal defense bar are former federal prosecutors who maintain their old ties to the U.S. attorney’s office.

“A lot of them were used to being able to ... just go straight to the top,” Gordon said. “Some of them got irritated that I was formalizing a process that for many years was handled very informally.”

Gordon said he can recall incidents over the years in which high-powered defense lawyers went over the heads of trial prosecutors and their supervisors to make their case with top officials in the U.S. attorney’s office.

“I firmly believe that’s wrong,” he said.

The past year has seen a large turnover of personnel at the U.S. attorney’s office. Gordon has hired 21 new lawyers since he took over.

He said the office was “getting too top-heavy with titles and not lean enough to prosecute cases,” so he stopped filling some supervisory slots and designated others as acting supervisors.

Despite his loyalty to his staff, Gordon is not known as Mr. Personality. He does not mince his words. Schmoozing with the staff ranks low on his list of priorities.

“I didn’t do it when I was rising through the office,” he said. “My preference is to sit down, get your work done, be friendly and nice, but not go around socializing.”

But Gordon said he does make a point of reaching out to his prosecutors with words of support after every trial, regardless of the outcome.

The most notable cases handled on his watch have included former Hollywood nightclub owner Eddie Nash’s guilty plea to racketeering charges; former Los Angeles Police Officer Rafael Perez’s guilty plea to civil rights violations; a guilty plea by Mark Jakob of El Segundo to fabricating a news release that caused nearly $110 million in losses to investors in Emulex Corp.; and the recent indictment of two Jewish Defense League leaders in an alleged bombing plot.

Former Assistant U.S. Atty. Duane Lyons, now in private practice, worked under Gordon when he was prosecuting major drug traffickers and money launderers.

“People who don’t know John very well may view him as standoffish or wooden or unemotional,” he said. “However, I don’t think that’s fair.”

Lyons said Gordon took pains to make sure that his feelings did not get in the way of his commitment to treating everyone fairly.

Looking back on the last 10 months, Gordon recalled asking Mayorkas as he was about to depart why he ever wanted to become U.S. attorney.

“I said to him, ‘Isn’t it more fun to be a trial lawyer or someone who keeps his hand in it?’ And he said something that has been borne out by my experience. It’s not more fun, but it’s ultimately more fulfilling and more satisfying to get to make the final decisions on overall office direction, the big-case resolution, and on hiring and promotions. So I have found this job satisfying and rewarding.”

What will he do when he has to vacate his office?

“I’ve been here 17 1/2 years, and my heart is in being a federal prosecutor,” he said. “So my first preference would be to remain in the upper level of management in the office. And if that’s not in the cards, then to go into private practice and do some white-collar criminal and some civil.”

Gordon then worried aloud whether that comment might be misunderstood by his new boss. He said he hopes it doesn’t sound like he is making any demands.