UPDATE: U.S. Attorney Capp resigns at Trump administration's request
NWI Times
March 11, 2017
HAMMOND — U.S. Attorney David Capp — one of several holdover appointees from President Barack Obama’s time in office — has submitted his resignation after being asked to do so by Donald Trump’s administration, his Northwest Indiana District office confirmed Saturday.
The announcement of Capp’s resignation comes in light of U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Friday abruptly requesting 46 chief federal prosecutors — all appointed previously by Obama — to resign, according to the Associated Press.
Many of the federal prosecutors who were nominated by Obama have already left their positions, but the nearly four dozen who stayed on in the first weeks of the Trump administration have been asked to leave "in order to ensure a uniform transition," Justice Department spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores told the Associated Press on Friday.
Capp, who was appointed to head the Northwest District office in 2010 by then-President Obama, said he had advised his staff last summer that he planned to retire this year, according to a news release.
"I had been looking toward a June retirement, so this is just a few months earlier," he said in a news release.
Public corruption
Capp, who joined the office in 1985, has a long history of cracking down on violent criminals and rooting out crooked politicians ensnared in public corruption in Northwest Indiana.
Of late, Capp’s office had been overseeing the public corruption cases against Lake County Sheriff John Bunich and Tim Downs, the sheriff's second in command, and a Lake Station towing firm owner regarding allegations Buncich solicited bribes and campaign contributions.
The U.S. attorney also charged Portage Mayor James E. Snyder last year with soliciting and receiving $12,000 in bribes in exchange for a towing contract with the city of Portage.
Asked what will become of those investigations with Capp’s resignation, Ryan Holmes, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s office, said Saturday will be things will be “business as usual.”
"They were all indicted. (The cases) are all going to move forward,” Holmes told The Times.
'An incredible record'
Former FBI agent and retired East Chicago police chief, Mark Becker, said Saturday that Capp was the 1st Assistant U.S. Attorney when Becker arrived in Northwest Indiana in the late 1980s.
Prior to his appointment as U.S. attorney, Capp served as interim U.S. attorney on multiple occasions, Becker said.
“And that’s an incredible record. He survived Democrat and Republican regimes so it shows they had tremendous respect for his ability to lead the U.S. attorney’s office without allowing influences and outside politics to affect his decisions,” Becker said.
Becker added it’s "a shame someone of his stature is being asked to leave earlier than perhaps he wanted to.”
“I’m not a politically driven person, but in view of what David Capp has accomplished, I have to shake my head at what this president was thinking. This was a decision with little thought,” Becker said. “This was a mistake.”
While it is customary for a new president to replace virtually all of the 93 U.S. attorneys, it often occurs at a slower pace, according to the Associated Press. Jeff Sessions, for example, lost his position as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Alabama in a similar sweep by then-Attorney General Janet Reno in 1993.
As supervisor years ago with the Gary Response Investigative Team, an FBI-led task force aimed at dismantling gangs and gang-related activities, Becker said he could count on Capp to support the team's efforts.
"Dave, he was the No. 2 man in the office at that time. He could have delegated, but he felt so passionate about our work and our attempts to help reduce Gary's violent crime, he took it personally and became our lead contact for prosecution in the U.S. Attorney's office," Becker said. "We could call him at 2, 3 in the morning, and he would get in his pickup truck and help us write warrants. That speaks volumes about the type of person he was."
Getting gangs off the streets
Those who worked closely with Capp through his 31-year career on Saturday noted a number of capstones — and credited his office for bringing the Region’s street gang members and robbery suspects to justice.
Last year, Capp announced his office had taken 56 members of the Latin Kings and Imperials Gangsters off the streets in the past four years alone.
"And those 56 were responsible — and this is just the ones we can prove — for 36 murders,” Capp said last year during a community forum of the wave of federal indictments on gang members.
Lake County Prosecutor Bernard Carter said Saturday that Capp “almost singlehandedly dismantled the Latin Kings.”
“They are nowhere near the threat that they were before those investigations,” Carter said.
In 2015, Capp's office teamed up with local authorities to investigate gang-related homicides. A number of recent federal indictments have targeted members of the Latin Kings operating in Hammond, East Chicago and Gary’s Black Oak section.
Carter said Capp's resignation is an "extreme loss" to Northwest Indiana's citizens.
"He was compassionate but yet very dedicated to the responsibilities of the job," Carter said.
Capp in a news release Saturday recalled speaking at a Gary church some years ago.
"We had just made some arrests and closed down a drug operation in the neighborhood the church served. Afterwards a gentleman came up to me, shook my hand, thanked me for our efforts and told me 'now my grandchildren can play in the yard again,'" he said. "That has always stuck with me and kept me focused on what our work is really about. I hope that I have played a part in making more yards in the Northern District of Indiana safe for 'grandchildren to play in.'"
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