The'Michigah Daily-Friday, May 22, 1981-Page 7
AT TORNEY GENERAL: SPECIAL PROSECUTORS UNNECESSARY
Smith suggests ethics law revisdon
WASHINGTON (AP) - Attorney General William
French Smith said yesterday there's never been any
justification, including the Watergate scandal, for
mandating the use of special prosecutors when
federal officials are accused of wrongdoing, and he
urged Congress to junk the law.
Smith told a news conference that the Justice
Department would ask a Senate subcommittee
headed by William Cohen (R-Maine) today to back
repeal of the special prosecutor provisions in the 1978
Ethics in Government Act.
HE SAID IF the administration fails on that score,
he would urge the Congress to drastically amend the
act to cover only the president, the vice president and
the attorney general, and to allow the attorney
general to name any special prosecutor.
Smith said also the act should be amended to allow
the same discretion not to pursue a case that the
department exercises in its normal course of
business.
Under the act, more than 200 top federal officials
are now covered. If the attorney general receives
allegations about any of these persons he must begin
a preliminary inquiry. Unless the preliminary
inquiry finds the allegations totally unfounded the at-
torney general must refer the case to a special
prosecutor.
SMITH TOLD the news conference that if the
Congress will not repeal or amend the act, the depar-,
tment would urge that it be allowed to expire when it
runs out in 1983.
The attorney general said that the act presented
"severe constitutional problems" over the doctrine of
separation of powers between the executive branch,
the Congress and the courts.
He also said the law was unfair and wasteful, in
that it subjected top government officials to in-
vestigations which would never have been pursued
against ordinary citizens.
"There's nothing in the history which I know which
would indicate that the system cannot work and work
well under the situation that existed prior to the time
that act was passed," Smith said.
Smith was asked whether he thought a special
prosecutor had not been needed during Watergate,
and he replied, "We didn't need a special prosecutor
statute during Watergate."
Death of 4th hun er
_ "*
striker sparks riots
From AP and UPIm
BELFAST, Northern Ireland - members of the Irish Republican Ar-
Hunger striker Patrick "Patsy" The rioting appeared the heaviest
O'Hara died last night in the Maze sine Saon dieared thn twhevekst
Prison. He was the second striker to e since Sands died more than two weeks
in a day, and the fourth this month in an ago.
ffort to olitical status for Irish GANGS UP to 200 strong swarmed
eft ogain ponto the streets of Belfast, London-
. nationalist prisoners. derry, Newry, Dungannon, Strabaho,
O'Hara died within 24 hours of fellow Portadown and Lurgan, police said.
prisoner Raymond McCreesh. Rioters The Roman Catholic prirhate of all
firebombed police stations and at- Ireland, Cardinal Tomas O'Fiaich, ap-
tacked security forces across Northern pealed in "near desperation" for com-
Ireland. W promise. He again denounced violence
O'HARA WAS the fourth convict to and described the killing this week of
fast to death this month. five British soldiers in an IRA explosion
McCreesh and O'Hara, both 24, star- as a "revolting deed which shames us
ted their fasts on the same day and died all."
on the same day. Bobby Sands starved McCreesh, a 24-year-old IRA
to death May 5, and Francis Hughes guerrilla, died in Maze Prison at 2:11
died a week later, on May 12. a.m. Thursday with his brother, the
Catholics stormed the streets across Rev. Brian McCreesh, at his side.
Northern Ireland and pelted security
forces with gasoline bombs and rocks.
- Snipers fired at police and regular
British soldiers trying to contain the
rioting.
ALL THE Catholic convicts entered
their "fast to the death" in a campaign
to force Britain to give them status as
political prisoners, but Prime Minister 375 N. MAPLE 769-1300
Margaret Thatcher has refused to con- Daily Discount Matinees
cede to their demands. All seats $2.00
O'Hara, serving an eight-year jail Tuesday-BUCK DAY
term for possession of explosives, was $1.00 ALL DAY
the first hunger striker to die, as a Forged by a god.
member of the Irish National t:30
Liberation Army, an extreme group Found by a King. 4:15
which claimed responsibility for the EXCALIBUR - 94a
murder of Lord Mountbatten and Con-
servative member of Parliament Airey
Neaves in 1979. The other three were
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