Anchorage Daily News

Career prosecutor Karen Loeffler was nominated by the White House Friday to become the next U.S. Attorney for Alaska.

Loeffler, 52, faces confirmation proceedings in the Senate before she formally assumes the office. Loeffler has been interim U.S. Attorney since March 1, when the Bush administration appointee, Nelson Cohen, returned to Pittsburgh.

U.S. Sen. Mark Begich, D-Alaska, said in a prepared statement Friday that he recommended Loeffler to the incoming Obama administration six months ago and is pleased she was formally nominated.

"She is a long-time Alaskan who is active in her community and has a no-nonsense approach to the law we need in Alaska's top federal law enforcement officer," Begich said.

The U.S. Attorney for Alaska is one of 93 U.S. attorneys in the United States and its territories. About 25 lawyers work in the Alaska office, which mainly prosecutes cases brought by the FBI or other federal agencies.

Loeffler was born in New York City. Her family moved to Minneapolis when she was 8 and she attended high school there. She graduated from Dartmouth College in 1979 and got her law degree from Harvard Law School in 1983. She followed her older brother to Alaska in 1985.

Her first big federal case was in 1988, when, as an assistant state district attorney in Anchorage, she was assigned to help then-U.S. Attorney Michael Spaan prosecute lobbyist Lewis Dischner and consultant Carl Mathisen in the North Slope Borough kickback and bribery scandal.

Both men were convicted and Loeffler began her specialty in white collar crime, officially moving to the U.S. Attorney's office in 1989.

Loeffler was deeply involved with the FBI in the early stages of the current corruption investigation of Alaska politics, but as the case expanded to include U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens and Rep. Don Young, her office was barred from participating by the Justice Department. Recently, Loeffler was successful in arguing that the Alaska office should be brought back in to assist.

In addition to her law practice, Loeffler is an accomplished amateur athlete. In all four of her undergraduate years, she was on the Dartmouth varsity tennis and downhill ski teams. In Anchorage, she plays softball, soccer and ice hockey, goes sea kayaking and is past president of the Anchorage Ski Club.

Find Richard Mauer online at adn.com/contact/rmauer or call 257-4345.

ADVERTISEMENT