President Obama has named Loretta Lynch as Eric Holder’s replacement as US Attorney, noting that despite her tough reputation as a prosecutor, she was also a “charming people person”.
She is the current United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
The President said in a statement today that he was grateful to long-serving former Attorney General Eric Holder, who had brought the law issue as a “living breathing” function. Speaking highly of the retired US Attorney, who made the US “safer and freer”, he said he couldn’t be prouder of Mr Holder.
But his nominee US Attorney nominee Loretta Lynch was described by President Obama. She has had a 30 year careers who has shown herself to be tough and fair, spending years “in the trenches” facing cyber crime, fraud and other issues, she graduated from Harvard and became chief US Assistant
He thanked the chair of the Judicary Committee for ‘making it on a Saturday’ to show his support.
Who is Loretta Lynch?
Who better than Wikipedia to outline Loretta Lynch’s career, here:
Lynch’s first legal job was as a litigation associate for Cahill Gordon & Reindel.[8]
Lynch first joined the Eastern District as a drug and violent crime prosecutor at the U.S. Attorney’s office in 1990. She was the lead prosecutor in the political corruption cases involving the government of Brookhaven, New York. From 1994 to 1998, she served as the chief of the Long Island office and became involved in several political corruption cases involving the government of Brookhaven, New York. From 1998 to 1999, she was the chief assistant U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District and headed the Brooklyn office. In 1999, she was nominated by President Bill Clinton to serve as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.[9] During her term as U.S. Attorney, Lynch oversaw prosecution of the New York City police officers in the Abner Louima case.
In 2001, Lynch left the office to become a partner at Hogan & Hartson (later Hogan Lovells). She remained there until January 20, 2010, when President Barack Obama nominated Lynch to again serve as United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.[7][10] From 2003 to 2005, she was a member of the board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.[11]
Following the July 2014 death of Eric Garner, an unarmed man who died of a heart attack after being held in a department-prohibited chokehold by a New York City police officer, Lynch agreed to meet with Garner’s family to discuss possible federal prosecution of the officer believed to be responsible in his death.[12][13]
Lynch’s office indicted Republican congressman Michael Grimm; was involved in the investigation of Citigroup over mortgage securities, sold by the bank, which resulted in the bank agreeing to a US$7 billion settlement; and was also involved in theUS$1.2 billion settlement with HSBC over violations of the Bank Secrecy Act.[14][15]
On November 8, 2014, President Barack Obama nominated Lynch for the position of U.S. Attorney General, succeeding Eric Holder, who had previously announced his resignation pending confirmation of his replacement. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, she would be the first African-American woman; the second African-American, after Holder; and the second woman, after Janet Reno; to hold this office.
