February 14, 2000

QUEENS DISTRICT ATTORNEY ANNOUNCES THREE NEW SENIOR STAFF APPOINTMENTS

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced today three important senior staff appointments. Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney for Administration Eileen Sullivan has been promoted to Counsel to the Chief Assistant District Attorney. Former Investigations Chief Robert D. Alexander has been named to head the office's newly created Computer and Advanced Technology Crimes Bureau and Assistant District Attorney James M. Liander, presently Deputy Chief of the District Attorney's Integrity Bureau, has been elevated to the position of Chief of that Bureau.

District Attorney Brown said, "I am pleased to announce the appointment of three career prosecutors to these important positions. Over the years they have repeatedly demonstrated their professional ability as prosecutors and their dedication to public service."

As Counsel to the Chief Assistant, Ms. Sullivan will assist Chief Assistant District Attorney John M. Ryan in overseeing the day to day operations of the Queens District Attorney's Office with special emphasis on program development and related funding outreach and representation of the District Attorney's Office with federal, state, and local agencies. She will also be responsible for special legal and management assignments on behalf of the Chief Assistant, including human resources management, staff development and supervision, special projects and investigations and civil litigation matters.

Ms. Sullivan, who initially joined the District Attorney's office in January, 1992 formerly served as Deputy Inspector General and Special Counsel in the office of the Inspector General of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority(MTA) where she had oversight responsibility for the staff's auditors, investigators, attorneys and engineers investigating potential fraud and abuse and in management reviews of the MTA and its subsidiary agencies' operations. She also conducted studies on issues of mismanagement, waste, unsafe conditions and other improprieties in the operation of the MTA and its subsidiaries and directed Inspector General teams in white collar and undercover criminal investigations. She also drafted and presented legislation from the Inspector General's office to the New York State Legislature and served as its representative as a member of the New York State Public Transportation Safety Board.

A graduate of St. John's University, Ms. Sullivan was awarded both her undergraduate and law degrees from that school. From 1975-1983 she served as an Assistant District Attorney in the Queens District Attorney's Office's Appeals, Supreme Court, Homicide, and Rackets bureaus. In 1994 she was appointed Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney for Administration.

Assistant District Attorney Alexander, in his role Chief of the newly created Computer and Advanced Technology Bureau, will be responsible for the investigation and prosecution of crimes involving computers and other advanced technology including Internet crimes against children and others. The Bureau will also serve as a focal point for training of office personnel to assist them in understanding and utilizing the latest technologies in this area. It will begin to develop an officewide capability to use advanced technology to collect and analyze crime data and intelligence, to detect crime trends and patterns and to investigate complex criminal enterprises. The Bureau will work closely with other law enforcement agencies investigating computer and advanced technology crimes and provide them with legal assistance and technical expertise.

Mr. Alexander graduated from the National Law Center of George Washington University in 1971 and briefly served in the Rockland County Public Defender's Office that year. After engaging in his private practice of law firm until 1974, Mr. Alexander joined the Rockland County District Attorney's Office, where he was appointed as an Assistant District Attorney and became a Senior Assistant District Attorney. He thereafter re-entered the private sector until March, 1982, when he joined the Queens District Attorney's Office. Over his tenure he has served in various positions in the Supreme Court, Major Offense and Homicide Bureaus and the Investigations Division.

As the newly appointed Chief of the District Attorney's Integrity Bureau, Mr. Liander will be in charge of investigating allegations of corruption and brutality leveled against members of the law enforcement community and violations of the public trust by public officials, municipal employees and attorneys.

Mr. Liander joined the Queens District Attorney's Office in June 1986. In 1989, after serving in the Rackets and Economic Crimes and Arson Bureaus, he was assigned to the District Attorney's Supreme Court Trial Bureau. The following year, he was transferred to the Integrity Bureau where he has been Deputy Chief since September 1993.

An alumnus of New York Law School, from which he graduated cum laude in June, 1985, Assistant District Attorney Liander was awarded a bachelor's degree at the University of Dayton. He began his professional career with the Social Security Administration in 1974, where his duties included that of legal assistant, until he left in 1981 to become a Special Agent in the Inspector General's Office of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, supervising criminal and civil investigations involving major losses within the Social Security and Medicare programs. He served with that office until he joined the District Attorney's office in 1986.

The appointments will take effect immediately.

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