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Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Mon Jan 29, 2024 4:58 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Wed Jan 24, 2024 4:03 pm
I just had my interview with the USA, which I think went well. I got some questions about my experience, but mostly it was "What can I tell you about the office?" This is a fly-over county usao. They have not been asked for references. What should I expect to happen next? Fingers crossed for good news. Might that be an offer? Or, would the next step be a request for references?
In my experience, it would most likely be a request for references, but it can depend on the office and how the USA likes to operate. Good luck!

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu Apr 11, 2024 12:52 am
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Jun 03, 2023 6:46 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 6:52 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:10 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Sun May 28, 2023 1:03 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Apr 17, 2023 7:50 pm
Tentative offer at MDFL
Willing to share any details about your background, the division, and the branch in MDFL?

Florida ties, T14, Biglaw, criminal division
How many years out? Crim trial experience at biglaw? Did you have ties within the office?
junior, White collar experience/civil trial experience, no
Sorry to bump an old post, but how long did your background check take?

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Mon Apr 22, 2024 7:28 pm
by Anonymous User
Stupid question here. Do AUSAs visit crime scenes? I know that many state prosecutors do.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Mon Apr 22, 2024 9:49 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Apr 22, 2024 7:28 pm
Stupid question here. Do AUSAs visit crime scenes? I know that many state prosecutors do.
Yes and no. They are pretty unlikely to visit an *active* crime scene, mostly because it runs too great a risk of becoming a witness, and you can't both prosecute a case and testify in it. So you don't want to go and actually assist with the investigation, b/c say you find a piece of evidence - boom, you're a witness, you can't continue as the prosecutor.

I'm not going to say that it has *never* happened, and if there is something particularly hairy going down they might well go to assist law enforcement on the ground, but more commonly they'd be on standby on the phone. Also, by "assist" I mean legal advice, not actual help with identifying/collecting evidence (b/c then you're part of the chain of custody).

Once the investigation is complete, I think it depends on whether the case is going to trial (or something else evidentiary like a motion to suppress). If you're going to trial it can often be helpful to go see the location for yourself to make sure you understand where/how the crime occurred, so you can put on evidence to show that to the jury, and maybe get some pictures taken of pertinent stuff that hasn't changed (like buildings or similar). There may also be circumstances where someone needs to see a scene before they can decide whether to charge it or not, although I don't think this is very common.

However, not all crimes really have a "scene" - for instance, something like wire fraud (if the pertinent evidence is in e-mails you probably don't need to know what the office the defendant sent them from looked like) or possession of child sex abuse material (if that arises from materials found on a defendant's phone, you'll examine the phone, but you don't have to do that in the defendant's own home or anything).

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Tue Apr 23, 2024 12:23 pm
by Anonymous User
I had an crim AUSA panel interview approximately 3-4 weeks ago in a competitive district. Since then it's been crickets. At this point should I just move on and assume I wasn't selected?

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Wed Apr 24, 2024 10:30 pm
by Anonymous User
Especially if this is SDNY, definitely do not dispair! I know many AUSAs who had a long gap between the first and second (and final) round and ended up getting hired.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Mon Apr 29, 2024 6:57 pm
by Anonymous User
Are there any child care benefits through the DOJ for being an AUSA? Trying to figure out how to manage having a baby and being an AUSA while my spouse works 9-5.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Sat May 04, 2024 9:00 pm
by Anonymous User
No. You get parental leave, which is 12 weeks paid leave in the 12 months immediately following giving birth/adoption, but you have to qualify for FMLA, so you have to have worked there for a year to get it. But no child care benefits.

Relatively recently we got info about a free service we can use that provides for X days or hours of backup/emergency care for children or others (like elderly parents); I don't have kids so haven't paid too much attention to the details, but it's intended to cover emergency care, so in theory somewhat helpful but not a long term option.

As for how you manage having a baby and being an AUSA while your spouse works 9-5... I don't mean to sound unkind, but you manage it pretty much the way all the other families with two working parents do (which is most families these days). Very few employers offer on-site/paid child care benefits. So your options are family, day care, and/or school once they get old enough.

My experience in a couple of different offices is that USAOs are pretty family friendly, in that there is at least the recognition that people have kids and need/want to take care of them and be involved in their lives. So the culture is generally supportive - at least, from what I can tell as someone without kids. Although, full disclosure, I've never worked in one of the super prestigious major metro offices, which doesn't make a difference WRT access to child care options, but might WRT family-friendly culture.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu May 23, 2024 8:47 am
by Anonymous User
So the pay scale for “Executive, Managerial, Supervisory, Special Assistant or Senior Litigation Counsel AUSAs” is different than line AUSAs. Does anyone know who qualifies as a “supervisory” or “managerial” AUSA? Is that only reserved for division chiefs or do deputy chiefs also qualify?

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu May 23, 2024 11:43 am
by Anonymous User
Any idea why there are so many Special AUSA (uncompensated) postings for California districts in particular? It seems crazy that there has only been one paid AUSA position posted in the entire state the last several months but there have been a ton of uncompensated positions posted. I get wanting to save money but it seems so out of step with districts in other states.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu May 23, 2024 7:44 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 8:47 am
So the pay scale for “Executive, Managerial, Supervisory, Special Assistant or Senior Litigation Counsel AUSAs” is different than line AUSAs. Does anyone know who qualifies as a “supervisory” or “managerial” AUSA? Is that only reserved for division chiefs or do deputy chiefs also qualify?
Yes, deputy chiefs count as supervisory, at least, in every office I’m familiar with - deputy chiefs directly supervise other AUSAs, so, supervisory.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu May 23, 2024 9:15 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 7:44 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 8:47 am
So the pay scale for “Executive, Managerial, Supervisory, Special Assistant or Senior Litigation Counsel AUSAs” is different than line AUSAs. Does anyone know who qualifies as a “supervisory” or “managerial” AUSA? Is that only reserved for division chiefs or do deputy chiefs also qualify?
Yes, deputy chiefs count as supervisory, at least, in every office I’m familiar with - deputy chiefs directly supervise other AUSAs, so, supervisory.
Makes sense. (I know it was a pretty dumb question on my part, but I am still new to this world.)

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu May 23, 2024 10:11 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 9:15 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 7:44 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 8:47 am
So the pay scale for “Executive, Managerial, Supervisory, Special Assistant or Senior Litigation Counsel AUSAs” is different than line AUSAs. Does anyone know who qualifies as a “supervisory” or “managerial” AUSA? Is that only reserved for division chiefs or do deputy chiefs also qualify?
Yes, deputy chiefs count as supervisory, at least, in every office I’m familiar with - deputy chiefs directly supervise other AUSAs, so, supervisory.
Makes sense. (I know it was a pretty dumb question on my part, but I am still new to this world.)
Not at all! I’ve been doing this for over 10 years now and I still run across things where I go “ohhhhh THAT’s what that means” and I either never knew or completely misunderstood till now. Didn’t mean to sound snarky (for instance, I realized when reading your question that I don’t know where the line between “managerial” and “supervisory” falls!).

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu May 23, 2024 10:15 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 10:11 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 9:15 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 7:44 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu May 23, 2024 8:47 am
So the pay scale for “Executive, Managerial, Supervisory, Special Assistant or Senior Litigation Counsel AUSAs” is different than line AUSAs. Does anyone know who qualifies as a “supervisory” or “managerial” AUSA? Is that only reserved for division chiefs or do deputy chiefs also qualify?
Yes, deputy chiefs count as supervisory, at least, in every office I’m familiar with - deputy chiefs directly supervise other AUSAs, so, supervisory.
Makes sense. (I know it was a pretty dumb question on my part, but I am still new to this world.)
Not at all! I’ve been doing this for over 10 years now and I still run across things where I go “ohhhhh THAT’s what that means” and I either never knew or completely misunderstood till now. Didn’t mean to sound snarky (for instance, I realized when reading your question that I don’t know where the line between “managerial” and “supervisory” falls!).
No need to worry, I didn’t detect any snark on your end. Thanks again for the insight. (And I wondered about the distinction between those two categories too.)

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Tue Jun 25, 2024 10:52 pm
by Anonymous User
Could anyone share the wait time between final interview to offer/rejection in NDCA, EDCA, and SDCA?

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Mon Aug 05, 2024 6:16 pm
by Anonymous User
Checking in re: most recent criminal NDIL job posting.

USAJobs has the application as 155 applicants. Is that the norm for postings? Looks like at least two slots from the start dates.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Mon Aug 05, 2024 9:44 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Aug 05, 2024 6:16 pm
Checking in re: most recent criminal NDIL job posting.

USAJobs has the application as 155 applicants. Is that the norm for postings? Looks like at least two slots from the start dates.
Based on what I’ve heard from AUSAs in much less competitive offices, that wouldn’t surprise me. (If anything, that might even be fewer applicants than what I’ve been told to expect.)

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu Aug 08, 2024 4:03 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Aug 05, 2024 6:16 pm
Checking in re: most recent criminal NDIL job posting.

USAJobs has the application as 155 applicants. Is that the norm for postings? Looks like at least two slots from the start dates.
Anyone heard anything? I suspect too early to tell but my application is still sitting at "application received"

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2024 11:29 am
by Anonymous User
Very dumb question here, but what USAOs outside of the major metro districts (NYC/DC/Chicago/Miami etc.) have “good” reputations because of the people who work there, cases they work on, etc? Are there offices that are well-respected for their work even if they’re not in major cities? (I’m probably thinking about this the wrong way, but since we are such a prestige obsessed profession, I wondered if that carried over to this context.)

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Sat Aug 24, 2024 11:50 am
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Aug 23, 2024 11:29 am
Very dumb question here, but what USAOs outside of the major metro districts (NYC/DC/Chicago/Miami etc.) have “good” reputations because of the people who work there, cases they work on, etc? Are there offices that are well-respected for their work even if they’re not in major cities? (I’m probably thinking about this the wrong way, but since we are such a prestige obsessed profession, I wondered if that carried over to this context.)
I’m curious to see how non-AUSAs answer this, but I do think it’s sort of the wrong way to look at it, although I can’t quite articulate why. My short answer is that I don’t think there’s any real consensus about this, or that trying to rank USAOs makes any sense. My long (rambling) answer follows.

First, respected by whom? I’m sure folks at Main Justice who work with USAOs across the country have opinions (and are probably the best informed) about better/worse offices, but not sure that translates more broadly.

Barring dramatic nationwide-scandals (see the Joshua Kindred mess in Alaska), I think most offices have reputations within their immediate communities, but not necessarily more widely, except based on sort of self-evident characteristics. Southwest border offices do a lot of immigration crime. Philly and Detroit do a lot of gun crimes. NDCA is going to have more tech stuff. SDNY is going to have complex financial stuff. Etc. What level of “respect” that translates to depends on what a given observer values. (In a vacuum that’s usually going to be stuff with higher monetary value, of course, but still, it depends.)

I think there’s kind of a default level of respect all USAOs get based on the fact that they’re USAOs, and that all the offices are respected for their work (assuming you don’t object to criminal prosecution on principle, of course).

It’s true that major metros have more varied caseloads and a higher proportion of complex cases, and the competition to get hired in those offices is usually greater so their AUSAs tend to have more traditionally elite qualifications. So in a vacuum, having them on your resume is probably “best.” But I don’t think that means non-metro offices are “worse” such that it makes sense to figure out which ones are “good” rather than good for you.

So in the end: why do you ask? Do you think you’re not competitive for the major metros (or don’t want to live in a major metro) but want to know the best alternative? The quality of your experience doesn’t really correlate with any national office reputation, but with a lot of internal qualities you have to dig into on a case by case basis, in part b/c they can change under different management. This is the kind of thing that lawyers in that community might have insight into (for instance, do the AUSAs all come across as jerks? Or miserable? Is the office notoriously hard to work with?) but won’t necessarily be nationally known.

Or do you want to know what office will best position you for something else post-USAO? That obviously depends on what you’re aiming for, but the experience you get and who can speak for you is probably as important as the office reputation, if not more. If you want to do white collar defense in NYC big law, they will want to see that you’ve done complex white collar work and handled it well. So it’s not clear that working at SDNY but only doing drugs/guns is better than being the white collar chief in SD Ind. That’s an extreme example, of course (and SDNY may still play better with NYC clients than SD Ind, for all I know), but once you’re looking at non-major metro USAOS, I’m not sure that NYC big law is going to distinguish much between D Kan or SD Ind or D Idaho.

(I’ve answered this assuming you want to be a criminal AUSA, just b/c that’s what most people want and there are way more criminal AUSAs. I think question probably makes even less sense for civil AUSAs.)

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Sat Aug 24, 2024 9:35 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Sat Aug 24, 2024 11:50 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Fri Aug 23, 2024 11:29 am
Very dumb question here, but what USAOs outside of the major metro districts (NYC/DC/Chicago/Miami etc.) have “good” reputations because of the people who work there, cases they work on, etc? Are there offices that are well-respected for their work even if they’re not in major cities? (I’m probably thinking about this the wrong way, but since we are such a prestige obsessed profession, I wondered if that carried over to this context.)
I’m curious to see how non-AUSAs answer this, but I do think it’s sort of the wrong way to look at it, although I can’t quite articulate why. My short answer is that I don’t think there’s any real consensus about this, or that trying to rank USAOs makes any sense. My long (rambling) answer follows.

First, respected by whom? I’m sure folks at Main Justice who work with USAOs across the country have opinions (and are probably the best informed) about better/worse offices, but not sure that translates more broadly.

Barring dramatic nationwide-scandals (see the Joshua Kindred mess in Alaska), I think most offices have reputations within their immediate communities, but not necessarily more widely, except based on sort of self-evident characteristics. Southwest border offices do a lot of immigration crime. Philly and Detroit do a lot of gun crimes. NDCA is going to have more tech stuff. SDNY is going to have complex financial stuff. Etc. What level of “respect” that translates to depends on what a given observer values. (In a vacuum that’s usually going to be stuff with higher monetary value, of course, but still, it depends.)

I think there’s kind of a default level of respect all USAOs get based on the fact that they’re USAOs, and that all the offices are respected for their work (assuming you don’t object to criminal prosecution on principle, of course).

It’s true that major metros have more varied caseloads and a higher proportion of complex cases, and the competition to get hired in those offices is usually greater so their AUSAs tend to have more traditionally elite qualifications. So in a vacuum, having them on your resume is probably “best.” But I don’t think that means non-metro offices are “worse” such that it makes sense to figure out which ones are “good” rather than good for you.

So in the end: why do you ask? Do you think you’re not competitive for the major metros (or don’t want to live in a major metro) but want to know the best alternative? The quality of your experience doesn’t really correlate with any national office reputation, but with a lot of internal qualities you have to dig into on a case by case basis, in part b/c they can change under different management. This is the kind of thing that lawyers in that community might have insight into (for instance, do the AUSAs all come across as jerks? Or miserable? Is the office notoriously hard to work with?) but won’t necessarily be nationally known.

Or do you want to know what office will best position you for something else post-USAO? That obviously depends on what you’re aiming for, but the experience you get and who can speak for you is probably as important as the office reputation, if not more. If you want to do white collar defense in NYC big law, they will want to see that you’ve done complex white collar work and handled it well. So it’s not clear that working at SDNY but only doing drugs/guns is better than being the white collar chief in SD Ind. That’s an extreme example, of course (and SDNY may still play better with NYC clients than SD Ind, for all I know), but once you’re looking at non-major metro USAOS, I’m not sure that NYC big law is going to distinguish much between D Kan or SD Ind or D Idaho.

(I’ve answered this assuming you want to be a criminal AUSA, just b/c that’s what most people want and there are way more criminal AUSAs. I think question probably makes even less sense for civil AUSAs.)
Thank you for the very thorough answer. I thought “ranking” USAOs didn’t make sense to begin with, and your answer confirmed that.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Wed Sep 04, 2024 3:26 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Aug 05, 2024 6:16 pm
Checking in re: most recent criminal NDIL job posting.

USAJobs has the application as 155 applicants. Is that the norm for postings? Looks like at least two slots from the start dates.
Any movement on this?

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Thu Sep 05, 2024 10:52 pm
by Anonymous User
Anonymous User wrote:
Wed Sep 04, 2024 3:26 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Aug 05, 2024 6:16 pm
Checking in re: most recent criminal NDIL job posting.

USAJobs has the application as 155 applicants. Is that the norm for postings? Looks like at least two slots from the start dates.
Any movement on this?
Got a rejection letter a few weeks back. My status didn't change on USAJobs/the internal website. Hopeful that it's a "maybe later" rejection and not a firm no.

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Fri Sep 06, 2024 7:51 am
by Publius78
Anonymous User wrote:
Thu Sep 05, 2024 10:52 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Wed Sep 04, 2024 3:26 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Mon Aug 05, 2024 6:16 pm
Checking in re: most recent criminal NDIL job posting.

USAJobs has the application as 155 applicants. Is that the norm for postings? Looks like at least two slots from the start dates.
Any movement on this?
Got a rejection letter a few weeks back. My status didn't change on USAJobs/the internal website. Hopeful that it's a "maybe later" rejection and not a firm no.
Was that for the job posting that went up in July?

Re: AUSA/USAO hiring

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2024 3:03 pm
by Anonymous User
Recently got a request for an interview in a major metropolitan area. Was told to keep the whole work day open and that there would be 2 panel interviews in the morning, a panel interview with supervisors in the afternoon, then an interview with the USA. Not sure what, if anything, to make of this. Is this typical?