by Robert Gehrke
Associated Press Writer
The Associated Press
A federal judge has been asked to hold Interior Secretary Gale Norton in
contempt for allowing the destruction of electronic documents in a lawsuit
over mismanaged American Indian money. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth
already is considering whether to find Norton in contempt for failing to comply
with a court order to fix a system that manages $500 million annually in royalties
from Indian land and for concealing her department’s failures.
Plaintiffs in a class-action suit over the department’s mismanagement of
the Indian money claim the electronic documents and e-mails were purged as
a further cover-up.
An Interior Department spokesman had not seen the motion, filed late
Wednesday, and could not comment Thursday.
The motion claims Norton and other Justice and Interior officials and
lawyers failed to prevent the document destruction.
“It was willful, it was systemic and it was done to cover up,” said
attorney Dennis Gingold, who is representing the Indians in their claims
that the government squandered more than $10 billion in royalties from
their land.
Last July, court-appointed investigator Alan Balaran found that the
Interior Department routinely erased e-mails despite Lamberth’s orders
that they be retained as evidence.
Lamberth heard 29 days of testimony earlier this year on the plaintiffs’
previous contempt requests. A ruling could come in a few weeks.
In 1999, Lamberth held President Clinton’s Interior secretary, Bruce
Babbitt, and his Treasury secretary, Robert Rubin, in contempt, fining
them $600,000 for concealing the destruction of documents.
The Interior Department is responsible for managing royalties from
grazing, logging, mining and oil drilling on Indian land, but the
plaintiffs allege the money was mismanaged for more than a century.
Norton has announced efforts to overhaul the management of the system.
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