Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Haden was found dead late Wednesday inside a vacant office at the downtown San Diego federal building that houses the U.S. Attorney’s Office, a death that was first reported after he had been missing earlier in the day. He was 48.
The San Diego Police Department said no foul play is suspected, and the county Medical Examiner’s Office is investigating what happened. For the people who worked with Haden, the loss landed hard because he was not only a longtime prosecutor but someone who had twice stepped in as acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California during leadership transitions.
Haden had spent 16 years in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, and colleagues described a lawyer who was known inside and outside the office for calm judgment and steady work. He was also a father of two school-aged children and a U.S. Navy veteran, details that sharpened the shock felt Thursday as staff tried to make sense of the death.
Adam Gordon held an all-hands meeting Thursday and sent an email to staff saying Haden was reported missing yesterday and was later found deceased. Gordon called it one of the darkest days in the office’s history, while saying Haden was a beacon of light and the best of us, words that underscored how deeply the loss cut through the building at 880 Front in Downtown San Diego.
One part of the case remains unresolved. A person familiar with the situation suspected Haden took his own life, but police have stopped short of saying that, and the official cause and manner of death have not been determined. That gap leaves the Medical Examiner’s findings as the next answer that matters, because they will determine whether this was a natural tragedy, an accident or something else entirely.
Cynthia Bashant said the court family and the legal community were devastated, and defense attorney Jeremy Warren said the criminal defense bar greatly respected Haden. Their reaction reflects how widely Haden was known in San Diego legal circles, and why his death inside the very building where he worked has become more than a private loss. It is now an active investigation, a mourning office and an unanswered question waiting on the Medical Examiner’s report.
