Bush Lawyers Unlikely to Face Criminal Charges

By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted May 5, 2009 6:56 PM CDT
Bush Lawyers Unlikely to Face Criminal Charges
John Yoo, in a 2008 file photo.   (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

The Bush lawyers who gave their blessing to waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques should not face criminal charges, a Justice Department report has concluded. The report does, however, say that Jay Bybee, John Yoo, and Steven Bradbury showed poor judgment and suggests that state bar associations consider reprimands and possible disbarment, the New York Times reports.

The 220-page draft report by an ethics unit of the Justice Department is now in the hands of Attorney General Eric Holder, who could make revisions. Attorneys for Bybee and Yoo asked former high-ranking Bush appointees to call the Justice Department in recent days in a bid to soften the report's wording, notes the Washington Post. Those two were held most accountable in a preliminary version of the report drafted in January.
(More Justice Department stories.)

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