David M. Barrett, the Independent Counsel now in his eleventh year of investigating charges against former Clinton HUD secretary Henry Cisneros, spent more in the last six months of fiscal year 2005 than did Plame prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald.

According to the legislatively mandated semi-annual audit of the two offices conducted by the Government Accountability Office, Barrett spent more than $850,000 during the six months ending September 30, 2005, while Fitzgerald spent slightly less than $180,000.

Barrett was appointed on May 24, 1995, to investigate allegations that Cisneros lied to the FBI about payments he made to his mistress before taking office. Cisneros pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor count nearly five years and $10 million later, but Barrett — whom I have come to call “Bartleby” — continued to chug along. In 2003, the federal judge panel overseeing his investigation ordered him to close it out, and after another three years and roughly $6 million, he issued the public version of his final report in January of this year. The ultimate tab for the investigation is approaching $20 million.

During the previous six months, Barrett ran up a $930,000 bill, as compared to Fitzgerald’s $112,000. And in the six months before that, during the heat of the Plame investigation, Fitzgerald spent $580,000 and Barrett, $1.2 million. Barrett has spent more in each six month audit period throughout his 11 year investigation — which, to repeat (because it really is unbelievable), resulted in a misdemeanor plea and a $10,000 fine for its subject — than Fitzgerald has spent on his entire investigation to date, which has bagged Dick Cheney’s number two and may be close to nailing Karl Rove or national security advisor Stephen Hadley, or both.

In fairness to Barrett, trawling the White House cesspool is only a part-time job for Fitzgerald, who has a host of high-profile prosecutions ongoing in Chicago, his home court. Whatever Barrett has been doing in the seven years since he nailed Cisneros, it’s the only thing he’s been doing.

Or is that backwards? Regardless, Barrett has earned a spot in the Independent Counsel firmament that will never, ever be eclipsed even in the unlikely event that the statute authorizing his ilk is one day revived. Bartleby, we’ll miss you.

=======================

UPDATE: I inadvertently excluded the reporting period of September, 2003 – March 2004, which includes the audit of Fitzgerald’s expenses from his appointment in January of 2004 to the end of that fiscal year. Those expenses totaled $26,592. During the same reporting period, Barrett’s expenses were $871,204.

The Fitzgerald audits, and others of independent or special counsel investigations, can be found on the GAO web site by searching for “Independent Counsel Expenditures” or “Special Counsel Expenditures,” in quotes as shown.

Six months ended March 31, 2004:

http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d041014.pdf

Six months ended September 30, 2004:

http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-05-359

Six months ended March 31, 2005:

http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-05-961

Six months ended September 30, 2005:

http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-485

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