Book Review Main Justice. the Men and Women Who Enforce the Nation's Laws and Guard Its Liberties. Jim Mcgee and Brian Duffy. Simon & Schuster (new York). 1996. 399pp. $25
| Pages | 385 |
| Publication year | 2021 |
70 CBJ 385. Book Review MAIN JUSTICE. The Men and Women Who Enforce the Nation's Laws and Guard Its Liberties. Jim McGee and Brian Duffy. Simon & Schuster (New York). 1996. 399pp. $25
Although the authors say it is intended for the general reader, Main Justice also contains a wealth of information for the practicing lawyer, especially one with criminal experience in the federal courts. Practitioners in Connecticut's federal courts in the late 60's and early 70's should find the book especially enjoyable in its discussion of the careers of David Margolis and Paul Coffey, two former federal prosecutors in Hartford's federal district court, now both senior officials of the U.S. Department of Justice. Margolis is Associate is Associate Deputy Attorney General of the United States; Coffey is Chief of the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section of the U.S. Department of Justice. Both are legend in the Connecticut U.S. Attorney's Office.
"This book is about the men and women who run the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington D.C. ...the huge apparatus of federal law enforcement that reaches into every American city and out beyond American shores." Known throughout the government, and the 94 U.S. Attorney's Offices scattered across the United States, simply as "Main Justice," the U.S. Department of Justice is clearly "the most powerful law enforcement institution in the world." Main Justice then goes on to explain in over 350 pages of readable prose why, in the authors' view, the Department of Justice is also, ironically, "the nation's best hope that the Rule of Law will prevail" despite the threats and temptations posed "by terrorists, ethnic Mafias and huge drug cartels."
Main Justice examines the U.S. Department of Justice through principal areas of Justice Department activity. Beginning, with the "war against drugs," the book identifies the challenges to law enforcement presented by the Cali drug cartel, "the world's largest exporter of cocaine" and one of the "biggest criminal enterprises in the world." The reader is taken inside the Miami-based "Operation Cornerstone" and introduced to the agents and federal prosecutors responsible for the innovative application of...
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