Thomas P. O'Brien

Thomas P. O’Brien
Personal details
Born	Thomas P. O’Brien unknown unknown
Spouse	Undisclosed
Occupation	Government ; Law
Website	[1]

Thomas P. O’Brien is the United States Attorney for the Central District of California. He was nominated on July 12, 2007 by President George W. Bush and confirmed by the United States Senate on October 4, 2007.

As the senior federal law enforcement official in the Central District of California, Mr. O’Brien is responsible for all federal criminal investigations and prosecutions, as well as all civil matters involving the United States, in the largest federal district in the country, encompassing seven counties and more than 18 million residents. In addition to his responsibilities as United States Attorney, Mr. O’Brien sits on the President’s Corporate Fraud Task Force and is Chair of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee’s Cyber/Intellectual Property Subcommittee.

Career

Prior to being selected as the United States Attorney, Mr. O’Brien served for more than two years as the Chief of the Criminal Division in the United States Attorney’s Office. Before that, he was Chief of the office’s Civil Rights Section, where he investigated and prosecuted federal hate crimes, racially motivated murders, human trafficking violations, and police misconduct cases. Mr. O’Brien has received numerous awards from the law enforcement agencies he has worked with, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the United States Department of State, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department, and the Los Angeles Police Department. He received the 2007 Anti-Defamation League Pacific Southwest Region’s Helene and Joseph Sherwood Prize for combating hate. In October 2007, he received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service – the highest award given by the Attorney General – for his role in investigating and prosecuting street gang members who committed hate-crime murders of African-Americans in Northeast Los Angeles.

Mr. O’Brien is a former Deputy District Attorney for Los Angeles County, California where he was assigned to the Hardcore Gang Division for more than five years. During that time, he tried approximately 65 cases, including dozens of gang murder cases, as well as cases involving allegations of rape, assault, kidnapping, car-jacking, counterfeiting, and narcotics trafficking. He was named Prosecutor of the Month in July 2000 by the Los Angeles County Association of Deputy District Attorneys.

Mr. O’Brien graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1981, and from the University of San Diego School of Law in 1993, where he was an Associate Editor of the San Diego Law Review and received his degree with honors. He has accumulated 2,000 flight hours as a Radar Intercept Officer in the F-14 “Tomcat” fighter aircraft, and is a graduate of the United States Navy Fighter Weapons (“Top Gun”) School.

Controversies

• Disbanding Of Public Corruption Unit Shortly after taking office as the United States Attorney for the Central District of California, O'Brien disbanded the U.S. Attorneys office in Los Angeles whose target was corruption of public officials, elected officials, and other governmental regulators.

He controversially launched an inquiry on Cardinal Roger Mahony under the honest services act, a law which is usually only applied to public officials.

Awards

O'Brien received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service, the Justice Department’s highest award, for his role in successfully prosecuting four gang members who conspired to assault and murder African-Americans in the Highland Park neighborhood.