Requirements for firms engaged in the design, installation and commissioning of fire fighting systems

OCLC Number: 556492099 Excerpt: ...often defer to us on the determination as to whether or not there has been an accidental fire, rather than an arson. DN: Is there advice you'd give to U.S. Attorneys ' offices in terms of how to respond, media-wise? JJ: In the last year everyone has been pleased with the way agencies and U.S. Attorneys ' offices have handled public relations. DN: Were there any specific obstacles that had to be overcome to make this task force function? If so, how were they overcome? JJ: Some of them we already touched upon. This is an investigation that proceeded in a climate unlike the vast majority of other investigations. We were faced with congressional scrutiny; public outcry; overlapping, potentially-conflicting jurisdictions. We had a wide array of Federal agencies that also were tasked with being part of the effort. Our main obstacle was coordinating all of the good will that we were trying to harness to get this effort underway. The second obstacle was reassuring the public and Congress that we were up to the task. DN: One of the best things about being an AUSA is that when a national tragedy occurs, AUSAs are asked to step up and deal with the fallout. From our perspective and our work on these national tragedies, we come up with a lot of information and ideas on prevention or add to the fund of knowledge to structure things in the future to make things work better. Have we learned things from this particular type of hate crime that we can use to further a positive exchange or improve relations? JJ: This effort is instructive on a number of fronts. You used the term " hate crime. " Some of the church fires were hate crimes. Some of them were clearly not hate crimes in the traditional sense. About a third of the arsons of African-American churches were committed by African-Americans. Obviously two-thirds were not, and in many of those cases we were able to bring civil rights charges clearly indicating that we were able to establish ...