Illustration by Sam Kerr

Obama’s nominee for U.S. attorney general stands to inherit the investigations into both the Ferguson shooting and the death of Eric Garner. It should be familiar ground: In 1997, after cops brutally abused a Haitian immigrant named Abner Louima, Lynch helped win convictions. Soon after, she was tapped to be the U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn’s Eastern District, where she took over an investigation into charges of excessive force in Giuliani’s NYPD. Her office was still negotiating with City Hall on reforms when George W. Bush took office and appointed a new U.S. Attorney. But she made it clear then that she believed the Department of Justice had a responsibility to effect systemic change to prevent these incidents. “When people, as they have in this city, say that they are afraid of the police,” Lynch said back in 2000, “what they really are expressing is an even deeper fear: that if they ever need help … they will have no one to call, nobody to protect them … That’s why it’s a federal issue.”