Overview

By Act of Congress, the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) was established in the Department of Justice (DOJ) on April 14, 1989. The OIG investigates alleged violations of criminal and civil laws, regulations, and ethical standards arising from the conduct of the Department's employees and its numerous and diverse activities. The OIG provides leadership and assists management in promoting integrity, economy, efficiency, and effectiveness within DOJ in its financial, contractual, and grant relationships with others. Also by statute, the OIG reports to the Attorney General, the public, and Congress on a semiannual basis regarding the significant work of the office.

Staffing & Budget

The OIG carries out its mission with a work force of approximately 370 criminal investigators, auditors, inspectors, and support staff.

The criminal investigators are assigned to offices in Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Colorado Springs, El Paso, Los Angeles, McAllen, Miami, New York, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, and Tucson.

The OIG auditors are located in offices in Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Philadelphia, and San Francisco.

Other components of the OIG — the Inspections Division, the Management and Planning Division, the Office of General Counsel, and the Special Investigations and Review Unit — are located in Washington, D.C.

The OIG does not have a fiscal year (FY) 1996 appropriation, but is operating under a series of continuing resolutions. Based on House and Senate Conference action, the OIG expects an appropriation of $28,960,000 and 325 permanent positions. In addition, the OIG expects to receive reimbursements from other components which will cover additional positions.

Contained in the OIG's FY 1997 budget is a request for additional audit resources of $11,924,000 and 10 positions to comply with the statutory requirements of the Chief Financial Officers Act of 1990 (CFO) and the Government Management Reform Act of 1994 to produce a consolidated Departmental financial statement audit in FY 1997.

Initiatives

Coordinated Efforts

The OIG frequently teams its divisions to ensure a coordinated approach in addressing significant matters in the Department. Through such efforts, the expertise of each division contributes to successful resolution of the issue. Examples include:

·  A joint Investigations and Audit Division effort in the District of New Mexico led to a guilty plea by a deputy U.S. marshal assigned as a Witness Security inspector who had been charged with embezzlement. The investigation revealed he converted to his own use $29,393 from cash payments intended for protected witnesses. OIG auditors assisting in this investigation found numerous instances of double billings and bogus or altered receipts as part of the scheme. The deputy agreed to make restitution in the amount of $28,800. Sentencing is pending.

Albuquerque Journal Thursday, February 22, 1996

To better detect future financial irregularities, OIG auditors trained U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) staff to analyze expenditures, and they are now conducting their own reviews.

·  At the request of Senator John McCain of Arizona, the Special Investigations and Review Unit (SIRU), assisted by agents from the OIG's Tucson Field Office, investigated allegations that an Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) detention enforcement officer (DEO) assigned to a Service Processing Center (SPC) was the target of unfair and unequal treatment because he declined to work Administratively Uncontrollable Overtime (AUO). We concluded that the DEO was not a victim of retaliation; however, his criticism about the payment of AUO to detention enforcement officers at the SPC was valid, as INS itself found in one of its own internal reviews. Our investigation also found evidence of inconsistent application of AUO for DEOs servicewide.

We advised INS to correct the AUO problems at the SPC. We also urged INS management to systematically address the AUO issue servicewide by implementing the recommendations of the INS internal inquiry and aggressively using a previously established review mechanism.

FBI/DEA Reporting

The OIG, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have adopted a joint agreement under which allegations of serious misconduct, including criminal misconduct, against DEA and FBI employees will be reported to the OIG. The OIG is now the Departmentwide repository of all complaints of misconduct except misconduct by Department attorneys that relates to their authority to investigate, litigate, or provide legal advice, which remains within the jurisdiction of the Office of Professional Responsibility.

Initiatives

National Performance Review

The OIG continued several initiatives that support the National Performance Review and related legislation that seeks to improve and streamline government.

Customer Service and Partnering:  The OIG actively seeks to engage in extensive outreach to Department components and program managers to offer services and assistance different from our traditional audits, inspections, and investigations. The following illustrate initiatives conducted during this reporting period.

·  Members of the Investigations and Inspections Divisions and the Office of General Counsel participated in the Department's Office of Investigative Agency Policies. This group comprises the Department's criminal investigative agencies (FBI, DEA, USMS, INS, OIG) and the Criminal Division and coordinates policy among these agencies. During the reporting period we addressed the following issues: "Disclosure of Impeachable Information Relating to Government Witnesses in Criminal Cases," "Guidelines for Reporting Information on Federal Fugitives," and "Revision of the United States Attorneys' Media Policy."

·  The Investigations Division and the Bureau of Prisons' (BOP) Office of Internal Affairs (OIA) jointly implemented a new automated method for BOP to report allegations that are primarily administrative in nature. The procedure allows BOP to electronically transfer certain allegations from OIA's data base to the Investigations Division's data base, eliminating the need to manually enter the data. The allegations consist of complaints that do not require the OIG to open a criminal investigation.

·  Inspectors continued to serve on INS' Growth Management Working Group and provided technical advice to INS personnel based on insights developed through a review of INS' ability to manage the large influx of new border patrol agents to be hired in FY 1996.

·  The Audit Division participated in a President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency (PCIE) subcommittee effort to reengineer the external quality control review (peer) process of OIG audit functions. This involved assessing the current legislatively driven process and providing options with recommendations to the full PCIE for decision.

·  Inspectors are participating in the Deputy Attorney General's Interagency Working Group on Sweatshop Strategy Coordination. This group will develop a coordinated strategy and mechanism for increasing the effectiveness of sweatshop enforcement efforts. Upon issuance of the final report, inspectors will brief the interagency working group on insights developed during its inspection of INS' efforts to combat harboring and employing illegal aliens in sweatshops.

Initiatives

Advanced Audit Techniques

The programs, activities, and operations of the Department are becoming more complex, far-reaching, and interrelated. The Audit Division has begun to develop a strong audit capability to respond to increasingly advanced program complexity. We will augment our traditional methods of analysis with innovative audit methodologies, including statistical, management science, and operations research models, tools, and techniques. Examples include:

• In our audit of INS' work force analysis models, we are assessing computer simulations that depict the operational consequences of various resource and work load scenarios in order to optimize scarce INS resources.

• In our current audit of INS' methodology for forecasting fees from operations, we are evaluating several forecasting methods, regression models, and software packages in order to improve the forecasting of fees to contribute to better planning in fee-related areas.

• We are looking into the feasibility of using computerized mapping to depict the effect of the FBI's Safe Streets Task Forces on violent crime in selected locations. As resources permit, we will examine the potential use of computer mapping technology as a tool for the FBI to optimize its Task Force resources.

• Our audit of USMS' management of property will seek to use advanced statistical sampling and computer matching techniques to allow an efficient audit of all USMS property dispersed nationwide.

Special Projects

Good O' Boy Roundup Report

In July 1995, national attention was focused on an annual private gathering in southeastern Tennessee known as the "Good O' Boy Roundup" (Roundup). News stories reported that the Roundup was a "whites-only" gathering of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) and other Federal law enforcement officers that resembled a "Klan rally" and at which these agents discriminated against blacks by posting racist signs, wearing racist t-shirts, performing racist skits, and playing racist music. A widely publicized excerpt from a home video filmed at a Roundup showed a sign that read, "Nigger check point." In addition, allegations of criminal conduct, including narcotics distribution and rape, were raised by affidavits of local Tennessee residents at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing held within 10 days of the original news stories.

THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, MARCH 14, 1996

The OIG conducted a wide-ranging investigation to determine whether any DOJ employees had attended the Roundup and, if so, whether they engaged in or approved of racial, criminal, or other kinds of misconduct at any of the 16 Roundups from 1980 through 1995.

Special Projects

The OIG was able to identify nearly 1400 persons who attended the Roundup between 1980 and 1995. Thirty-six current or former DOJ employees attended a Roundup while employed by DOJ, and eight current DOJ employees attended a Roundup prior to their DOJ employment. Twenty-three of these individuals attended only one Roundup. We found no evidence, and indeed received no allegations, that any current or former DOJ employee directly engaged in racist or other misconduct — other than one inappropriate comment by an FBI agent, who received a suspension for his conduct at the Roundup. With respect to a second individual, formerly employed by the INS but now an employee of the Treasury Department, we transmitted information to the applicable Department of Treasury component by which he is now employed for consideration of possible discipline.

The OIG concluded that the Roundup was not, as it was portrayed in the media stories, a "Klan rally," an intentionally "whites-only" racist gathering, or a haven for criminal conduct. Nor was the Roundup dominated by Federal law enforcement personnel. We determined that what began in 1980 as an unofficial gathering of 58 law enforcement officers and their friends evolved over the years into an event that by the early 1990s attracted close to 500 people, only 10 percent of whom had any Federal law enforcement affiliation.

Although we concluded that much of the early Roundup news coverage was overblown and distorted, our investigation revealed ample evidence of shocking racist, licentious, and puerile behavior by attendees occurring in various years. In some, but not all, of the last six years, the Roundup was marred by acts of racist misconduct including skits, music with racist lyrics, racist confrontations, and wearing, trading, and selling t-shirts with racially insensitive messages. We found substantial evidence of rampant alcohol abuse, lewd performances, public nudity, strippers, and a hostile environment for women, especially in the later years of the Roundup. Claims by local residents that drug dealing, drug use, and gang rapes took place at various Roundups were exhaustively investigated, but were not supported by any credible evidence.

We recommended that DOJ provide further guidance and training about what constitutes conduct that brings the Department or one of its agencies into disrepute. The report is available through the Internet at: <http://www.usdoj.gov/oig>, by selecting "OIG WWW Information Services" and then selecting "Special Reports."

Zona Rosa

At the request of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, the Inspectors General of the Departments of Justice, State, Defense, and the Central Intelligence Agency are performing a governmentwide review of the response of the United States Government to murders of four marines in 1985 in the Zona Rosa district of El Salvador. The marines were gunned down by guerrillas as they were sitting in a sidewalk cafe. Recently, controversy has arisen over who was responsible and whether planners of the attack were later admitted to the United States or received U.S. Government benefits. We are participating in the coordinated Inspectors General investigations and will review the Department's response to the murders.

Special Projects

Update on Prior Reported Special Investigations

In our prior Semiannual Report to Congress, we reported on three special investigations on which we continued our work in this period. One involves the review of the FBI's performance in the identification and apprehension of Aldrich Ames. A second concerns allegations that INS senior managers in Miami intentionally created a false picture of conditions at the Miami International Airport and the Krome Detention Facility for a congressional delegation that visited in June 1995. Finally, we are continuing our investigation into allegations of wrongdoing in three units of the FBI crime laboratory. These allegations concern whether misconduct was committed in some of the Department's most significant prosecutions, as well as whether general procedures adequately promote the quality assurance necessary for the laboratory. Work on all three matters is proceeding.

Other Activities

OIG On-Line Report Availability

The OIG has created its own home page on the Internet's World Wide Web. Many audit, inspections, and special reports are available at the following Internet address: <http://www.usdoj.gov/oig>. In addition, the same materials are available through IGNet's World Wide Web server at <http:// www.ignet.gov/>.

Integrity Awareness

In addition to responding swiftly to misconduct allegations, the OIG believes additional benefits can result from an effort to educate and deter employees from engaging in misconduct. To educate DOJ employees on ethics, agents continued conducting integrity awareness briefings, reaching 968 DOJ employees at 34 different events.

High Risk Areas

The Department and the Office of Management and Budget have identified 10 specific DOJ areas with a high risk for fraud, waste, and abuse. During this reporting period, the OIG issued audit and inspection reports that addressed five of the high risk areas.

President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency

The Inspector General is a member of the PCIE. OIG senior staff participate in PCIE activities — such as the Inspections Round Table, an annual investigations conference, and meetings of the Chief Financial Officers Group — that relate to their respective duties. The Inspector General is also a member of the Investigative Standards and Training Subcommittee and the Professional Development Committee. In addition to his formal assignments, the Inspector General is active in the expansion of IGNet, a network involving the various Offices of Inspector General throughout the Executive Branch and through which electronic mail and other kinds of information, including reports of various kinds, can be exchanged and made available within the Inspector General community and to the public.

Other Activities

Review of Legislation and Regulations

The Inspector General Act of 1978, as amended, directs the Inspector General to review proposed legislation and regulations relating to the programs and operations of the Department. Although the Department's Office of Legislative Affairs reviews all proposed or enacted legislation that could affect Department activities, the OIG independently reviews proposed legislation regarding the OIG itself or fraud, waste, and abuse in the Department's programs or operations. During this reporting period, the OIG reviewed nine pieces of proposed legislation and provided comments on the "Federal Financial Management Improvement Act of 1995" and the "Information Technology Management Reform Act of 1995."