April 28, 2005: Deputy Attorney General, Justice Department Officials Enthusiastic about Exploring US Attorney’s Idea to Have FBI Tape-Record Interrogations

Richard Hertling, the acting assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel, writes an email to Richard Trono, an aide in the Office of the Deputy Attorney General (ODAG), concerning a conversation Trono had with US Attorney Paul Charlton of Arizona (see November 14, 2001). Charlton wants to begin tape-recording interrogations by FBI agents of suspected criminals, a policy the FBI resists. Hertling says he has discussed the matter with Charlton, and has advised Charlton to have the Attorney General’s Advisory Council (AGAC) form a task force on the issue. Hertling is aware that Trono has expressed an interest in having an ODAG working group address the issue. “I already have a lawyer assigned to the issue,” Hertling writes, “and he ca[n] do a fair amount of the leg-work to make this happen.” Trono responds with enthusiasm, and indicates that Deputy Attorney General James Comey is also interested in setting up a working group to study the matter. Trono says that after Comey announced it at a recent US Attorneys conference, “I immediately had half a dozen USAs [US Attorneys] approach me with passionate views (interestingly, on either end of the debate).” [US House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary, 4/13/2007 ]