Death is the great silencer.
It's always odd to read the obituary of someone who was, in life, a great noisemaker,
whether it is actual
noise or just the legal kind.
Robert Merkle, Who Tried Big Trafficker, Dies at 58
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TAMPA, Fla., May 8 — Robert W. Merkle Jr., who as United
States attorney here successfully prosecuted
the Colombian drug baron
Carlos Lehder Rivas, died at
a hospital in nearby Clearwater
on Monday. He was 58.
His family declined to disclose the cause of death, but newspaper reports said
he had been suffering from cancer.
Mr. Merkle was the chief
federal prosecutor for the Middle
District of Florida from 1982
to 1988, a role in which he won not only a conviction
of Mr.
Lehder, whom the authorities described as having been responsible for 80
percent of the Colombian cocaine smuggled into the United States, but also an
indictment of Gen.
Manuel Antonio Noriega, the Panamanian
military ruler later captured
in the American
invasion of his country.
Mr. Merkle was born
in Washington and became a running back on the football
team at the University of Notre Dame, where he later earned his law degree.
A flamboyant
prosecutor, he acquired the nickname Mad
Dog for his aggressive
style. Critics acknowledged his legal skills but questioned his methods.
Defense lawyers, accusing him of abusive and bullying tactics that they compared
to McCarthyism,
called for Justice Department
investigations, which consistently cleared him of inappropriate
conduct.
Survivors include his wife, Angela, and nine children.
Copyright
2003 New York Times (registration required)
7:44:11 AM 
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