A nonprofit watchdog group yesterday called for an investigation of David H. Stevens, chief executive of the Mortgage Bankers Association, arguing that he may have violated ethics laws relating to his previous position as commissioner of the Federal Housing Administration, the New York Times reported today. The National Legal and Policy Center, a right-leaning ethics-in-government group, urged the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia and the inspector general at the Housing and Urban Development Department to conduct an official review of Stevens’s activities while he was at HUD and after he left the agency in March 2011 to lead the mortgage association, one of the most powerful lobbying organizations in Washington, D.C. An investigation, the center said, would determine whether Stevens had violated federal rules barring former government officials from “communicating or appearing on behalf of persons or entities with respect to matters in which the former officials ‘personally and substantially participated’ during their government service.”
A former lower-level Dewey & LeBoeuf LLP employee charged in a financial fraud case alongside leaders of the defunct law firm has struck a deal with prosecutors to have the case against him dropped in a year, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Former Dewey client relations manager Zachary Warren had been scheduled to go to trial in March. A prosecutor with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office told a judge yesterday that under a deferred prosecution agreement, Warren would no longer face criminal charges if he completes 350 hours of community service. Assistant District Attorney Peirce Moser said in court that prosecutors plan to focus their attention on a retrial slated for September against two of Dewey’s former executives, ex-chief financial officer Joel Sanders and former executive director Stephen DiCarmine. Sanders and DiCarmine have pleaded not guilty and have maintained their innocence.
