U.S. Attorney, Forest Service regional boss pledge to probe complaints

Scott Sonner

Wednesday, Nov. 24, 1999 | 9:20 a.m.

RENO, Nev. - The Forest Service is forming a fact-finding team to investigate allegations of intimidation and threats against agency workers in Nevada and the Justice Department is reaffirming its commitment to prosecute such cases.

The U.S. attorney for Nevada and the Forest Service's regional boss in Utah issued joint statements on Tuesday pledging "vigorous investigation and enforcement of claims of threats and harassment" of Forest Service employees.

"We take such claims very seriously," U.S. Attorney Kathryn E. Landreth said in a statement from Las Vegas.

"Any reported claims will be vigorously investigated and appropriate enforcement action will follow," he said.

Landreth and Jack Blackwell, regional forester in Ogden, Utah, said they were responding to recent newspaper accounts of threats to workers.

Gloria Flora, supervisor of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest in Nevada, cited concerns about the safety of her employees among the reasons for announcing her resignation earlier this month.

A Forest Service law officer complained to Flora two months ago that federal prosecutors in Nevada had declined to prosecute dozens of cases referred to it by the Forest Service since 1990 - at least 21 felonies and 52 misdemeanors involving more than 100 people.

"For whatever reasons, it appears the U.S. Attorney's office in Las Vegas does not understand that the lack of prosecution of these cases involving permittees or public officials has continued to fuel the open and flagrant lawless disregard for federal law and regulations in Nevada," Wayne Smith wrote in the Sept. 3 memo obtained by The Associated Press.

"This lack of support places federal law enforcement officers and agents at risk as they enforce the same regulations in the field," said Smith, a supervisory special agent. "As a result, there continues to be a very real concern for employee safety in these situations."

Blackwell acknowledged in the joint statement on Tuesday he had been "disappointed in some of these past decisions" against prosecution of alleged law breakers.

But he said he recognizes "it is totally the call of the U.S. Attorney's Office and I support and respect their decisions and I look forward to further improving our relationship."

Landreth said there have been no recent documented claims of threats filed by Forest Service employees in Nevada.

She said there is a process for reporting personal threats to federal employees through the U.S. Attorney's Office and the FBI. She said all decisions regarding prosecutions are reviewed at three levels in her office.

"There is much greater burden of proof in criminal cases and we make the call on a case-by-case basis based on our legal experience and judgment," Landreth said.

"The underlying reasons for any criminal declinations, including lack of evidence, are communicated to the Forest Service," she said.

She said that while criminal action was not taken in some of the cases referred by Agent Smith, some were in fact resolved by civil actions brought by the U.S. Attorney's Office.

For example, Blackwell praised the efforts of the Landreth's office to obtain a temporary restraining order blocking citizens of Elko County from reconstructing a road on a national forest in northeast Nevada in defiance of the Forest Service.

The dispute over that road, washed out in a flood in 1995, and protection of the threatened bull trout in the Jarbidge River along the road have been at the center of an ongoing fight between local residents and the Forest Service.

Blackwell said he and Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck are establishing the fact-finding team, which should begin work soon looking into "stories of intimidation, harassment and threats to employees."