Federal Prosecutor Cleared Of Charges That He Pulled for a Mafioso

U.S. Assistant Attorney Jeff Auerhahn, free of a cloud of suspicion
that he helped protect mobster Vincent "Vinnie the Animal" Ferrara.

Since 2003 U.S. Assistant Attorney Jeffrey Auerhahn has been under a cloud of suspicion, when a federal judge accused him of outrageous misconduct. But A recent panel of federal judges has lifted the cloud for Auerhahn, who was facing disciplinary action while handing the court’s chief judge a rebuke, according to a story by David Boeri called Federal Prosecutor Cleared Of Charges To Surprise Of Some and published on WBUR.

Vinnie the Animal 

"Trouble began for Jeffrey Auerhahn with his case against Mafia lieutenant Vincent Ferrara, known to the cops as 'Vinnie the Animal.' [Ferrara, from Boston, Mass., was formerly a capo of the New England-based Patriarca crime family of La Cosa Nostra.]

"In the 1990s, Ferrara pled guilty and got an even longer prison sentence because a witness testified that Ferrara had ordered a murder.

"Years had passed when in 2003, that witness, Walter Jordan, came forward to say he had not been telling the truth about Ferrara. He said that Auerhahn knew [that he had lied but kept quiet].

"Last year Jordan told me that he had testified that Ferrara had ordered the murder. 'Yes I testified, but I testified and they knew I was lying. Jeff knew I was lying, because I told him so,' Jordan said. 'All they wanted was Vinnie. It was Vinnie, Vinnie, Vinnie the whole time. If I didn’t say it was Vinnie I was off to prison that was my ticket to freedom.'



"In reaction, Judge Mark Wolf called hearings in 2003. The key moment came when a Boston cop testified that indeed the witness Walter Jordan had admitted during preparation for trial that he wasn’t telling the truth.

"The cop said that back in 1993, he had told Auerhahn that the witness had recanted.

"At the end of those hearings in 2003, Judge Wolf accused Auerhahn of perpetrating a fraud upon the court, saying he had no choice but to release the two defendants, one of them Ferrara, a Mafia figure he considered dangerous.

"Later, Judge Wolf would be upheld by the First Circuit Court of Appeals, which called Auerhahn’s behavior 'outrageous', 'egregious', 'feckless' and 'a grim picture of blatant misconduct.' "

"The Department of Justice privately reprimanded Auerhahn."

Read the rest of the article: Federal Prosecutor Cleared Of Charges To Surprise Of Some | WBUR.