Bill Myers, The Examiner
2008-01-04 08:00:00.0
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WASHINGTON -

D.C. Councilman Phil Mendelson, chairman of the council’s Judiciary Committee, has demanded that Mayor Adrian Fenty’s top adviser explain why he fired a veteran litigator who was supposed to defend the District’s gun ban before the nation’s highest court.

In a letter to Peter Nickles, Mendelson said he was “mystified” by the firing of Alan Morrison as special counsel to the city.

“Please explain: (1) the basis for this action; (2) the basis for seeking this action before you have actually taken the role of acting attorney general; and (3) your

plans for proceeding with the Supreme Court case,” the letter states.

Morrison was fired Dec. 28 in an e-mail from Eugene Adams, a deputy attorney general. He was scheduled to lead the District’s legal team to the Supreme Court in early March for arguments over the District’s strict gun regulations. It’s the first time the court has agreed to hear a Second Amendment case in at least 70 years.

As chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Mendelson supervises the Attorney General’s Office. He has been a long-standing critic of Nickles, Fenty’s most trusted adviser and a longtime friend of the mayor’s father.

“I think he’s a good lawyer, but I don’t think that he’s infallible,” Mendelson said of Nickles. “He has to account for how this new era is going to work. That litigation is very important.”

An adverse verdict in the gun case could affect gun laws around the country. The District is scheduled to hand in a 15,000-word opening brief, drafted mostly by Morrison, today.

Morrison told The Examiner that Nickles called him into his office Dec. 21 and demanded to know whether Morrison was part of “a campaign” to embarrass the Fenty administration.

Nickles couldn’t be reached for comment Thursday.

He came to the administration as Fenty’s general counsel after four decades as a corporate litigator. But Nickles had already assumed practical control over the District’s day-to-day legal affairs even before Fenty named him acting general counsel.

Last month, then-Attorney General Linda Singer resigned, saying she was frustrated by the role Nickles was playing.

The potential conflict with Mendelson could make things even harder for the Fenty administration. Nickles lives in rural Virginia and the attorney general must live in D.C. He can serve as “acting” attorney general for only six months by law.

Got a tip on the Fenty administration? Call Bill Myers at 202-459-4956 or send him an e-mail, bmyers@dcexaminer.com.