Federal Prosecutors in Manhattan Tap a New No. 2

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http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/09/22/federal-prosecutors-in-manhattan-tap-a-new-no-2/

A top federal prosecutor’s position in Manhattan will soon have a new occupant: Richard B. Zabel is being promoted to deputy United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, according to a person with knowledge of the decision.

Mr. Zabel will succeed Boyd M. Johnson III, who has served as the No. 2 under Preet Bharara, the United States attorney, ever since Mr. Bharara was appointed by President Obama in 2009. Mr. Johnson is leaving for private practice.

Over the last two years, Mr. Zabel has run the Southern District’s criminal division, a time when the office has handled the nation’s most prominent insider trading cases, a spy prosecution, and a string of terrorism, public corruption and international narcotics cases.

Mr. Zabel had worked as a lawyer at the firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauser & Feld, representing clients in federal and state investigations. In the 1990s, he served as a prosecutor in the Southern District, including running the office’s narcotics unit.