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For DOJ watchers wondering whether Michael Mukasey would be a "loyal Bushie" or independent from the White House, there's some evidence today that would point to the latter.

The Justice Department opened a criminal investigation and appointed an outside prosecutor to handle the probe into the CIA's destruction of video tapes showing detainee interrogations. Mukasey said that a joint preliminary inquiry by the DOJ's National Security Division and the CIAs inspector general determined there is a basis for initiating a criminal investigation of this matter.

Meet John Durham (pictured), the first assistant U.S. Attorney in Connecticut, who has been appointed an Acting U.S. Attorney to lead the investigation. He will report directly to the deputy attorney general. The probe would normally be handled by the U.S. attorney in eastern Virginia, where the CIA headquarters are located, but the office recused itself. Mukasey said the move was made in order to avoid any possible appearance of a conflict with other matters handled by that office.

Durham played baseball at Colgate University -- Go Red Raiders! -- and received his J.D. from Connecticut Law. He worked first as a local prosecutor in Connecticut before moving to the DOJ's organized crime strike force, which was later folded into the local U.S. Attorney's offices.

This isn't Durham's first high-profile assignment from Main Justice. In 1998, then-AG Janet Reno appointed Durham to explore allegations that FBI agents and police officers in Boston have been in bed with the mob. Click here for a hagiographic 2001 profile of Durham from the Hartford Courant. Said Boston lawyer Anthony Cardinale of Durham: "I've been up against them all over the country and I'd put him in the top echelon of federal prosecutors. He's such a decent guy you can't hate him." Said an FBI agent: "There is no more principled, there is no more better living, there is no finer person that I know of or have encountered in my life."

With those quotes seven years old, we wanted to see if he was still such an awesome guy. So the Law Blog checked in with Richard Blumenthal, the attorney general in Connecticut, who also sung Durham's praises. "He is relentless and tireless in pursuing every lead and every bit of information that could open avenues for prosecution but he is also a prosecutor of absolute integrity who will never shade or distort a piece of evidence to achieve some desired result," said Blumenthal, who has worked with Durham on numerous cases. "He lets the chips and the facts fall without any predisposition and often agonizes about what's legally right and fair."