Don't Try Lying to This Guy

By Reynolds Holding

When the U.S. Attorney's office in Chicago needed a new top prosecutor in 2001, then Senator Peter Fitzgerald of Illinois called Louis Freeh, director of the FBI, for advice. "I asked, 'Who is the best Assistant U.S. Attorney in the nation?'" he recalls. "Freeh said, 'Patrick Fitzgerald.'" The Senator, who is not related, then called Mary Jo White, the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan. "I asked her who was the best assistant in her office. She said, 'Patrick Fitzgerald.'"

Chicago had its man.

Whether Patrick Fitzgerald still ranks among the nation's best prosecutors is open to debate, but his success in securing the conviction of I. Lewis Libby on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice probably won't hurt his standing. Fitzgerald pursued the Libby case with the same persistence he has shown throughout a 19-year career dogging drug lords, Mafia kingpins and assorted terrorists. He tolerates no obstacle, especially lying, which he once compared to "throwing sand in the umpire's face."

Fitzgerald, 46, developed his sense of fair play while growing up in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, with parents he has described as "hardworking, straight, decent people." His father, a doorman on Manhattan's Upper East Side, reportedly arrived early for every shift and rarely took vacations. Fitzgerald himself worked as a janitor during high school and as a doorman in the summers while attending Amherst College, from which he graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1982. He then received a law degree from Harvard.

Fitzgerald's rise began in 1988 when he joined the prestigious U.S. Attorney's office in Manhattan. In 1992 he prosecuted brothers John and Joseph Gambino, two of New York's biggest Mafia leaders. The case ended in a mistrial, which threw Fitzgerald into a funk, but his outlook brightened in 1994 when the Gambinos pleaded guilty to drug trafficking. That same year U.S. Attorney White picked Fitzgerald to prosecute Omar Abdel Rahman, the "Blind Sheik," for plotting with nine associates to blow up New York City landmarks. Rahman was sentenced to life in prison, and Fitzgerald developed a reputation as one of the nation's best prosecutors. "He was the full package," White recalls, "an incredible investigator ... and superb trial lawyer." And for all his earnest purpose, Fitzgerald was also known among colleagues as affable and funny. During the Gambino case, he playfully interrupted co-counsel with an off-the-wall note asking: "Is there beer in the fridge?"

Fitzgerald gained national attention after settling in Chicago. The U.S. Attorney's office in the city had been investigating dozens of public officials since 1998, including then Governor George Ryan, and Senator Fitzgerald felt he needed an outsider. "I didn't want somebody who would be under the thumbs of the locals," he says. "He was the most nonpartisan person you could find." Patrick Fitzgerald started work 10 days before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

His office prosecuted several prominent terrorists and indicted Ryan in December 2003. Less than a month later, the Justice Department picked Fitzgerald to investigate the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity. He pursued the case intensely. When it became apparent that no one would be indicted for the leak of Plame's identity, he didn't let up and, to the media's discomfort, compelled several journalists to testify before the grand jury. He even forced the New York Times' Judith Miller to serve jail time when she wouldn't testify. After Libby was indicted essentially for lying, Fitzgerald defended the charges vigorously: "Any lie under oath is serious."

True to his reputation, Fitzgerald remained as the U.S. Attorney in Chicago throughout the case. When the trial ended Tuesday, he sounded eager to return to his "day job," as he called it, and his next case: the prosecution of press baron Conrad Black for allegedly defrauding shareholders of his Hollinger International media empire. The trial is scheduled to start March 14.