FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Stephanie Hanna (O) 202/208-6416

April 21, 1995

WILMA A. LEWIS SWORN IN AS INTERIOR INSPECTOR GENERAL

Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt today swore in Wilma A. Lewis as Inspector General of the Department of the Interior. Nominated for the office by President Clinton in January, Lewis was confirmed by the Senate on April 6, 1995.

"Wilma Lewis exemplifies the level of intelligence and integrity that it takes to be an effective Inspector General. I welcome her taking an independent appraisal of all levels of this department, and exposing waste, fraud or abuse wherever she can find it," Babbitt said.

Since September, 1993, Lewis served as Associate Solicitor in Interior's Division of General Law, where she managed and supervised the division responsible for legal work in a variety of areas, including equal employment opportunity compliance, labor, personnel, procurement, torts, ethics, general legal services and work involving U.S. territories.

Before joining the department, she had held a number of significant positions, including Deputy Chief of the Civil Division, in the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington, DC. During her almost eight years in that office, she served as lead counsel in the litigation of a wide variety of civil matters on behalf of the United States in federal court, at both the trial and appellate levels. Prior to her tenure with the U.S. Attorney's Office, she had served as an Associate with the Washington, DC, lawfirm of Steptoe & Johnson.

Lewis has served on the Civil Justice Reform Act Advisory Group for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, and is currently a member of the Advisory Committee on Local Rules for the District Court. She also has served as a lecturer and instructor on issues of employment discrimination law, as a Professorial Lecturer in Law in trial advocacy at the George Washington University National Law Center, and as a member of the faculty for the College of Trial Advocacy.

Lewis earned a Juris Doctor degree from Harvard Law School in 1981, and received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Swarthmore College, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. A native of St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, she excelled both athletically and academically, representing the Virgin Islands in competitions in both basketball and tennis.

U.S. Department of the Interior