He was on the Appeals Council of the Social Security administration. He worked in kansas city and was promoted to the Appeals Council out there in washington. I stayed here until i went to college. When did you get interested in criminal justice . Good question. I think all many, if not all are drawn to the criminal justice section of the law. It is sort of cops and robbers. You want the good guy to prevail. By the time i was in law school, i was very interested in criminal Justice System. You went to law school where . Columbia, 1970 until 1974. By the time you went to columbia, who were the biggest influences on your life . Where did it come from . I think this is something all Young Lawyers need to be aware of a little bit. If youre in law school and you do well, a lot of folks in that category are expected to clerk for a federal judge. Wonderful job. I did that. I went to a very Strong Law Firm in the private sector. I did that. But i guess my exposure really was as a law clerk. I was in manhattan, a federal judge. I saw the u. S. Attorneys Office Operating in the courtroom. I never got it out my head i would very much like to do that. After a couple years in the law firm, i applied in the late 1970s, early 1980s. I thought i had died and gone to heaven. It was a wonderful job. Its a lot of responsibility for a young lawyer. Essentially your client is your conscience. You are there to do what you think is right. Its a pretty satisfying job to have. In terms of who influenced me, my supervisors in the u. S. Attorneys office. A little later on when i went back into the government, i worked for andy maloney, who was the u. S. Attorney in the Eastern District. I had been a partner in a Major Law Firm by then. I would point to him as the only person i would call a mentor in my career. Can you remember the first time you knew the name john gotti . Before i went back into the government, john gotti had been tried and not successfully prosecuted. Before i went to the Eastern District as mr. Maloneys chief assistant. When i was there, i was very actively involved in really supervising the gotti prosecution which ultimately led to his conviction. How many times was he tried . Three times. He was acquitted twice. The third time he was convicted. Were you in the courtroom . I was in the courtroom a lot of the time, but i was not part of the trial team. I was involved in a lot of the strategy calls. Mr. Maloney was in the trial himself along with mr. Gleason. Ironically when i became the u. S. Attorney of the Southern District a couple years later, we prosecuted john gottis son, john a. Gotti, also known as junior. Was he convicted . He pled guilty, yes. So with the former head of the gambino family, cosa nostra, whatever label you want to put on it, did you ever fear for your own life . I did not fear for my own life. You have to be prudent about your security risks as a prosecutor. I think everybody realizes this. There are a lot of rules in the organized crime spaces and arenas and one is not to draw attention to yourself by harming a prosecutor or a judge. That is not true with other criminal groups. Some of the violent drug gangs, for example, i think are a bigger security threat. When i became u. S. Attorney in manhattan, by really happenstance, the trade center just before i became u. S. Attorney, so we did a lot of Major International terrorism cases and there is security from those cases. John gotti did what . He was convicted of racketeering. He basically extorted money from people for protection payments. He was the boss of the family. Multiple murders were carried out with his, him being responsible for those as well. It is really a soup to nuts crime wave. I remember seeing a u. S. Attorney stand in front of microphone and all that, but what is behind that . In order to get someone convicted like john gotti i guess he has been dead for years what is there that we dont see . An extraordinary amount of work that you dont see. Not even exciting work. It is not like you would run on a tv show or something. It is painstakingly going through records to show him as going from here to there. A huge break in that case was that sammy the bull gravano, the right hand of gotti, became a government witness in the middle of the trial. Deciding whether to use him as a cooperating witness. Again, he is someone with his own serious crime record. Including murders. Do you use someone like that as a witness that you in effect vouch for as prosecutor to the jury . What you do not see out in the public, in front of the camera is all of the agonizing you go through to make a decision like that, preparing him to testify, making certain he is telling the truth when he takes that stand. Did you help prepare them to testify . I was involved in that process. What was he like up close . Very bright, extremely bright. He had lived a life of crime. That came through talking to him, too. You mentioned the terrorist attack. This is mayor deakins. You will probably remember this. The terrorists most potent weapon is not a bomb. It is fear. It is that that we, the public officials, must do our utmost to combat. With the announcement of the earlier arrest of those alleged to have bombed the World Trade Center, we have taken a significant step in depriving these terrorists of their anonymity and their most cherished weapon, fear. We have begun to reveal the face of our attacker. Terrorism is a destructive, insidious, and cowardly enterprise. By its very nature it can cause fear and alter and destroy our civic life, if we permit it. That was 21 years ago. What do you remember when the World Trade Center was bombed in 1993 . Obviously we were taken aback. We learned more and more every day. It took a while again, years before we knew what the nature of that threat was to be that bombing. Shortly thereafter i was appointed to be the u. S. Attorney in manhattan and became responsible for the prosecution of the case and was very actively involved in that case, as well as four or five other Major International terrorism cases. Again, the public was not aware of this at the time what was happening pretty contemporaneously with the trade Center Bombing was an ongoing plot to blow up the bridges and tunnels connecting new jersey and new york. The notion being within a single 24hour period, they could blow up these tunnels. Also blowing up the u. N. Also blowing up the fbi building in manhattan. That fell to me as i went from manhattan to brooklyn to supervise. Deciding when to take down that case. What i mean by that every day there are more and more people involved in that plot. You obviously want to build the evidence to have a successful prosecution. You want to bring as many involved into that net as you can, but you never want to err on the side of is this going to get away from us and theres going to actually be a bombing . One of the things i did was immerse myself in that case and participate in that decision, when to take that case down, when to make the arrests . Do you remember when you did that . Absolutely. Youre balancing, getting the evidence you need to prosecute, but never take a chance. So that is really what you are balancing. It is 24 7 agonizing time, no question about it. Somewhere in colorado is a man named ramzi yousef. What you know about him . Ramzi yousef was one of the masterminds of the trade Center Bombings. He was a major participant in what was called the air manila plot which came along somewhat later, basically a plot to blow up a number of number of jumbo jets from asia to the United States. Again killing thousands of people was the aim within 48 hours. He was a fugitive. He fled the day of the World Trade Center bombing. He was a fugitive for about two years, i guess. I was very much involved. He was identified by happenstance. It is good to be lucky sometimes. There was a fire in the apartment in manila where he and his cohorts were trying to carry out this airplane bombing plot. The police came, he fled. Shortly thereafter he was captured in pakistan. He was returned to new york for prosecution for both the trade Center Bombing and that air manila plot. I was in fbi headquarters when he was flown back to stand trial. Very dangerous, very brilliant, very scary person and terrorist. He said he hated us and hated israel. Why . The baseline ideology was to topple any government that did not follow the tenets of really the terrorist organization. And the goal for the west was to destroy the west, to destroy our government. And to do it by killing innocent civilians. He represented himself in the manila air plot prosecution. He was convicted of that. In a courtroom . In a courtroom. In new york . In new york. He had the constitutional right to do that, by and large, if you are a criminal defendant. He announced it very late into the prosecution. Two or three days before the case opened. The judge allowed him to go pro se. I remember when that was announced to the jury. You could see the stiffening there. They took note of that. He was basically standing within a foot and a half of the jury box the whole time. One of the most frightening things about watching him english is not his first language, not a lawyer. He was at least as good and i would say without insulting anyone else as a lawyer in the case at least as good as the professional lawyers that represented the other defendants, and probably better. Frighteningly intelligent. Frighteningly quick study. His uncle is Khalid Sheikh mohammed . Yes. I think that has been confirmed. When you read this, the 1994 defendants for the World Trade Center bombing. The 1995 trial of 12 defendants for the day of terror plot is that the tunnels . Exactly. 1996. You are the u. S. Attorney at this time. 1996 trial of the three defendants for the air manila plot. Ramzi yousef and the driver of the ryder van for the World Trade Center bombing. You knew all this. What was it like on september 11 . You knew all these people. 9 11 and one of the other major trials after that, the bombing of our embassy in west africa. We essentially indicted Osama Bin Laden twice. He was among our defendants. He obviously remained a fugitive. I was still u. S. Attorney on 9 11. In my office obviously a day no one forgets. A horrific day. Those of us who knew the most, and we ended up knowing a lot in our office, just by virtue of these cases. I made sure we continue to investigate, follow the lead so we could share that information with parts of our government. I think none of us would be surprised and indeed expected another attempt on the trade center. He said his goal was to topple the towers into each other. But he said, i didnt have enough money to build a big enough bomb. Certainly the expectation was there would likely be another attack, but not of this dimension. Was there a moment when he was representing himself that you thought he was winning . No. No. Why is that . I have a lot of faith in juries. We had the day of terror trial, which the blind sheikh was the leader of. It was a ninemonth trial. This is the bridges in the tunnel trial. 12 defendants, as you mentioned. The oj Simpson Trial paralleled it exactly in time. And there were contrast, i think, in terms of the trial when they were being taken in. I think new york juries, and i do not need to confine it to only new york juries, they are very bright, conscientious, savvy. They become fearless in a situation like that. And then the proof was strong. The proof was strong. One interesting sidebar was the oj Simpson Trial was televised and the yousef ramzi trial was not. What you think of that . Should it have been televised . I am not a proponent of cameras in the courtroom because i think they affect behaviors witnesses in ways, even jurors in ways in ways that are not constructive at all times. That is a hard question. You say you want sunshine shone on these trials. I think it was a shame it was not shown on television for two reasons in this particular case. Both, if you listened and followed it, it was a very scary story of what was happening. Basically a war that had been declared on the United States by a terrorist organization, very dangerous terrorists on trial. And i think judge mccasey, his control over the courtroom, the dignity of that proceeding went forward. It is something you want the American People to see. Back to the manila fire, if that fire in his apartment hadnt happened, do you think those people would have been killed . Was he that good . Very high likelihood that wouldve occurred. The plot was far along. They had done a test run on a flight that had a layover. Was this manila to japan . Exactly. They planted it under the seat of a japanese passenger. It went off midair. Killed the japanese passenger. That was the test run. Within weeks of carrying out the broader plot. I certainly think there was a high likelihood it wouldve been successful. He got off the plane. He did. He essentially carried on the ingredients he needed, was able to assemble the bomb in the lavatory, in the airplane bathroom. Seat 26k. I dont know why i have remembered that, but i have. He got off. He was off the plane, but the bomb went off. When you get on a plane, do you think of that . I dont think of that. But what i do think of is how much more enhanced our Airport Security is, but there are holes in it. I do think about that. I do not specifically think about that plot. Here you are in 1996 with bill clinton. Mr. President , thank you, in particular for your leadership and unswerving commitment to have a comprehensive, tough, but fair antiterrorism bill enacted now when it is so badly needed. It is my distinct honor and privilege to introduce the president of the United States. Mr. President , every american is safer today because of you. On behalf of all Law Enforcement and all americans, we thank you. [applause] this is a serious subject, but excuse me for asking this question. You are about five feet tall. I am exactly five feet tall. You have a little thing you were standing on. The reason i ask is this earlier you referred to someone called you attila the hun. What does it mean being five feet tall in this world that you live in . I thought about this even recently. It has taken me a long time to realize im short. The only time i realize im short is if someone is 67 or 68. I am looking up at an angle. It has never impacted me, other than the inconvenience of being able to reach certain things. I dont think it has had an influence at all. So you are not conscious of being around all of these taller people and being tougher because of that . I am not. There was a profile written recently about me where there was a bit of emphasis on my height. I asked my colleagues what they thought of it, and gee, i never noticed that i was short until i read that. It is not something that is on my consciousness. It never has been. Here is what you said in his speech september 27, 2000. This is one year before 9 11. You said the entire u. S. Information, financial, and Communications Infrastructure is at risk for terrorist attacks. Why did you i assume it seems obvious but why did you feel this strongly . This was before 9 11. You went through the use of trials and all that stuff. Did anybody listen to you . There were a number of people in the government listening, more over time. What happened to me essentially was again, is guarded by happenstance, the tragedy of the trade Center Bombing in 1993. And i was also involved with this plot to blow up the bridges in the tunnels. A lot of information came to us as a result of those trials to convince me that this threat was here to stay. We were at risk inside the United States, outside the United States. What i did was form the first Terrorism Unit in any u. S. Attorneys office. I think it was the only one formed before 9 11, period, with the goal of lets not lose what we have learned here. Lets not lose what we have learned. We believe were under a significant longterm threat. Lets keep following these leads. I hoped i would never have another case. I was not seeking prosecution. Over time more and more people although not all people appreciated the gravity of the threat. In that same speech you mention Osama Bin Laden. Yes. He came on our radar screen i think for the first time, again, its always a learning experience. Youre dealing with bits of information. Today we look back on it. Oh, gee, Osama Bin Laden, you knew about him. I think 1996 was when we first even heard of him. A small transfer of money to one of the participants in the manila plot, the trade Center Bombing. Not much known about him at that time. You try to focus on everybody who emerged. You knew that there was involvement in the terrorist organization. You did not know how significant. We did not indict him for the first time, twice in 1998, once for conspiring against u. S. Interests abroad. Unfortunately, he was never captured. We indicted him later that same year for the bombing of the east african embassies. We still learned something every day. Cia and the fbi eventually formed what is known as station alec, i think it was called, just focused on bin laden. But i dont think that happened until probably about 1997 i may be off a year or two. Why do you think 9 11 happened and we did not catch it . I think colin powell said it was a failure of imagination in some ways. Everybody expected more efforts, but not the way it occurred. Why were we attacked . We are to this day the great satan to al qaeda and associated terrorist groups. With the goal of destroying us in using whatever means possible to do that, including, i would say at time