Goodling Says No Again To Request For Testimony

Attorneys for Monica Goodling, a Justice Department official caught up the U.S. Attorney firing scandal, again asked the House Judiciary Committee today not to call their client before the panel to discuss the matter.

John Dowd, Goodling's lawyer, told Reps. John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Linda Sanchez (D-Calif.), who are leading the investigation for the committee, in a letter today that Goodling will not agree to testify or be interviewed by committee staff, either in private or public. Goodling, an advisor to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, will instead invoke her Firth Amendment right not to answer questions.

Goodling is asserting her consitutional privilege not to answer questions from the House or Senate Judiciary committees "after learning that Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty had privately told Senatpr Schumer that Mr. McNulty had not been entirely candid in his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee and had blamed Ms. Goodling and others for failing to inform him of pertinent facts prior to his testimony." Goodling, through Dowd, has denied the claim by McNulty.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) has written to Gonzales to ask whether Goodling, who has taken personal leave from Justice, is still on the department payroll.