WASHINGTON – [Salt Lake Tribune]- The head of a Justice Department task force targeting obscenity, Brent Ward, complained last year that U.S. attorneys in Arizona and Nevada were resisting filing charges in obscenity cases forwarded by the task force.

Both U.S. attorneys were eventually fired by the Justice Department, part of a purge of eight federal prosecutors that now has Congressional Democrats demanding accountability from the department.

“We have two U.S. attorneys who are unwilling to take good cases we have presented to them,” Brent Ward, the former U.S. attorney for Utah and head of the obscenity task force, wrote to Kyle Sampson, then-chief of staff for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. “In light of the A.G.’s comments . . . to ‘kick butt and take names,’ what do you suggest I do?”

Ward referred to the Arizona matter as “urgent.”

Sampson, who resigned Monday night amid growing furor over the firings, referred Ward to regular channels in the department’s criminal division.

A week earlier, the two U.S. attorneys Ward referenced, Paul Charlton [pictured] in Arizona and Daniel Bogden in Nevada, had been put on a list prepared by Sampson and forwarded to then-White House Counsel Harriet Miers of prosecutors that the administration should consider replacing.

Specifics of the case, and whether Ward’s complaint factored into the decision to seek Bogden and Charlton’s dismissals are unclear. Ward declined to comment Wednesday, referring questions to a Justice Department spokesman, who did not return a phone message.

Tennessee Rep. Steve Cohen, a Democrat, asked Bogden about the obscenity issue at a hearing last week, and Bogden said it was “the first I have heard that that was any type of issue.”

“That certainly wasn’t anything that was relayed to me,” said Bogden, adding that his office had a fivefold increase in child-exploitation prosecutions since 2005. “I’m kind of surprised to hear that there’d be anything contesting what we were doing in the areas of either child exploitation or obscenity.”

The Justice Department has said there was “no particular deficiency” that led to Bogden’s removal, but Charlton had resisted seeking the death penalty in one case and had a policy of recording FBI interviews, both against the department’s wishes.

E-mails released Tuesday lay out how Sampson orchestrated a nearly two-year effort, coordinated with the White House, to identify U.S. attorneys who should be replaced.

In all, eight were asked to leave. Several have since said they received improper calls from Republican lawmakers or were threatened with retaliation by a Justice Department official.

Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, joined House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Calif., and Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., at a meeting Wednesday with White House Counsel Fred Fielding to discuss congressional requests for information on the matter.

Fielding said he anticipated being able to provide the documents Congress requested by Friday, but did not commit to the White House allowing Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove to testify before Congress.

Cannon urged Fielding to produce the relevant documents so the committee could get the facts on the table and move beyond rhetoric.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to meet today to consider authorizing subpoenas for Sampson, Rove, Miers and others.

Gonzales, who accepted Sampson’s resignation Monday night, said his chief of staff failed to give complete information to Justice Department officials, who then gave incomplete testimony to Congress.

Gonzales said he accepts responsibility for mistakes that were made, but insisted he was unaware of the effort to replace prosecutors.

On Wednesday, Sen. John Sununu, R-N.H., became the first Republican in Congress to say Gonzales should step down, The Associated Press reported.

President Bush, in Mexico, said Wednesday he backs his attorney general.

“He’s right, mistakes were made, and I’m, frankly, not happy about it, because there is a lot of confusion over what really has been a customary practice by the presidents” of replacing prosecutors, Bush said. “This issue was mishandled to the point now where you’re asking me questions about it in Mexico.”

Bush said Gonzales will go to Congress to clarify the situation.