Departmental Ethics Office

Each component has a Deputy Designated Agency Ethics Official who is responsible for administering the ethics program within his or her component.

Find the ethics official for each component

Welcome to the Departmental Ethics Office website. On this website you can find the various laws and regulations governing the conduct of Department of Justice employees. We have included general information on the Executive Branch Standards of Conduct, the conflict of interest statutes, the Department's supplemental standards of conduct and various other ethics rules, regulations and policies. We have organized the ethics rules by subject which you can access through the left navigation menu. A click on highlighted citations or phrases will provide you with more information.

The complete text of the Standards of Conduct and the Department's supplemental regulations can be found at 5 C.F.R. § 2635, 5 C.F.R. § 3801 and 28 C.F.R. § 45. The Office of Government Ethics’ website contains Executive Order 12731, which sets forth the Principles of Ethical Conduct for Government Officials and Employees.

The Departmental Ethics Office, located in the Justice Management Division, is responsible for administering the Department-wide ethics program and for implementing Department-wide policies on ethics issues. The office provides advice and training directly to employees in the Department’s Senior Management Offices, the Justice Management Division, the Office of Public Affairs, the Office of the Federal Detention Trustee, the Office of Dispute Resolution, and the Office of Tribal Justice, and supervises the ethics programs in the remaining Department components.

We hope this website will assist ethics officials in managing their ethics programs. We also encourage employees to use the website as a source of information, but they should remember that certain rules are complex and require some analysis in applying them to specific situations. For this reason, employees should always seek the advice of an ethics official when contemplating any action that may be covered by the rules.

Allegations of misconduct involving Department attorneys that arise from their authority to investigate, litigate, or provide legal advice should be reported to the Department's Office of Professional Responsibility.

Questions concerning professional responsibility issues such as the McDade amendment and contacts with represented parties should be directed to the Department's Professional Responsibility Advisory Office on (202) 514-0458.

Allegations of fraud, waste, abuse, or misconduct by Department of Justice employees should be reported to the Office of the Inspector General (OIG). Contact information is on their web site.