Synopses & Reviews
The first sitting federal judge in U.S. history to be imprisoned for a crime committed while on the bench. The first federal judge impeached by Congress in a half-century. It has an ominous sound to it, conjuring images of bribes paid in alleyways, of august figures in black robes sullying their offices for sordid payoffs. And, indeed, the case against U.S. District Court Judge Harry E. Claiborne of Nevada contained those elements as the Department of Justice charged in December of 1983. Claiborne, the DOJ said, violated his office in exchange for bribes of less than $100,000 paid by brothel owner Joe Conforte. This book lays out the misguided assumptions, gullibility and malice of Claiborne's federal pursuers, and shows how they were duped. Using never-revealed information and a careful evaluation of the grand jury proceedings and two trials it took to bring Claiborne down, and an extraordinary investigation of the Justice Department's case undertaken by Nevada's Supreme Court this book challenges the reader's faith in the DOJ's ability to live up to its own name.