Special Prosecutions Division
The Special Prosecutions Division supervises investigations and prosecutes cases involving a vast array of types of public corruption at the federal, state, and local government levels, including: paying for official employment; making payments for the direct or indirect personal benefit of public officials in exchange for the officials' action or inaction on public votes, contracts, and other issues; influence peddling; issuing large campaign contributions in exchange for government contracts; skimming political funds for personal use and failing to disclose the theft to state election and campaign regulators; protecting illegal businesses in exchange for payments; stealing public funds, oftentimes through artifice and device; public officials' laundering bribes and other corrupt payments through nominees, bagmen, and sham corporations; obstructing justice by pressuring public-employee witnesses to alter their accounts of events by threatening these witnesses with the loss of their positions or enticing them with promises of future financial security.
The Special Prosecution Division's mission is to investigate and prosecute these corruption matters as the allegations present themselves. The Division's decision to investigate and/or prosecute a particular case is based on the strength of the proof and an analysis of the federal public corruption statutes at its disposal. The Division consists of 12 Assistant U.S. Attorneys and a complement of paralegals, secretaries, and investigators. The Division works in cooperation with its federal law enforcement partners—principally the FBI, the IRS-Criminal Investigation, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Inspector General.