Lawrence Walsh, Iran-Contra prosecutor, has died

WASHINGTON (AP) – Lawrence E. Walsh, the special prosecutor who spent six years investigating misconduct by Reagan administration officials in the Iran-Contra affair, has died.

He was 102.

Walsh was a highly successful Wall Street lawyer who served as a federal judge, president of the American Bar Association and as the No. 2 official at the Justice Department in the Eisenhower administration.

But the most high-profile work of his life was as a court-appointed independent counsel in the Iran-Contra controversy who relentlessly pursued evidence of wrongdoing.

Walsh’s detractors said the investigation was a clear case of prosecutorial abuse.