the dismissal of the US attorneys might affect cases of public corruption and voter fraud. According to the National Law Journal, Just the appearance of political influence in cases related to those firings, combined with the recent, unusual reversal of a federal public corruption conviction in Wisconsin [c.f., Georgia Thompson], some say, will spur aggressive defense lawyers to question the political motivation of prosecutors in certain cases; make magistrates and judges more skeptical of the evidence before them; and perhaps even chill line prosecutors in their pursuit of some indictments. By mid-September 2007, nine senior staff of the Department of Justice associated with the controversy had resigned. The most prominent resignations include: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty; Acting Associate Attorney General William W. Mercer resigned from the acting office prior to Senate confirmation hearings for the same position, and returned to his post as U.S. Attorney for Montana (he held dual positions); Chief of staff for the Attorney General Kyle Sampson Chief of Staff for the Deputy Attorney General Michael Elston; Director of the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys (EOUSA) Michael A. Battle; the subsequently appointed Director to the EOUSA, Bradley Schlozman, also the former acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division; the Department of Justice's White House Liaison Monica Goodling In June 2008, a grand jury was empaneled to consider criminal indictments against officials involved in the firings. The grand jury was presented evidence from ongoing investigations at the Department of Justice Inspector General's office and at the DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility. Inspector General Report and Special Prosecutor On September 29, 2008 the Justice Department's Inspector General (IG) released a report on the matter that found most of the firings were politically motivated and improper. The next day Attorney General Michael Mukasey appointed a special prosecutor Nora Dannehy to decide whether criminal charges should be brought against Gonzales and other officials involved in the firings. The IG's report contained "substantial evidence" that party politics drove a number of the firings, and IG Glenn Fine said in a statement that Gonzales had "abdicated his responsibility to safeguard the integrity and independence of the department." The report itself stopped short of resolving questions about higher White House involvement in the matter, because of what it said were the refusal to cooperate of a number of key players, among them Karl Rove, Senator Pete Domenici