Richard Cordray / AP

BY: Elizabeth Harrington Follow @LizWFB
April 3, 2014 11:50 am

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Richard Cordray told a whistleblower at his agency to have her attorneys “back down” after she filed a complaint alleging a “pervasive” culture of intimidation and hostility within the bureau.

Angela Martin, a senior enforcement attorney at the CFPB, testified before the House Committee on Financial Services on Wednesday, claiming senior managers within her office bullied and demoted her for speaking out against mismanagement.

Scott Pluta, the CFPB assistant director of the Office of Consumer Response, demoted Martin after she filed a formal complaint of discrimination for being “isolated” and prevented from doing any “meaningful work” in December 2012. Martin has not been assigned a single case or enforcement matter since she dissolved her own law practice to work for the CFPB in 2011.

After filing her complaint, Martin, a former civilian attorney for the judge advocate general at Fort Bragg, was then removed from all of her job duties.

“There is a pervasive culture of retaliation and intimidation that silences employees and chills the workforce from exposing wrongdoing,” she said.

As her complaint moved forward, Cordray personally reached out to Martin, asking to have her lawyers “back down.”

more @ http://freebeacon.com/politics/cfpb-director-told-whistleblower-to-back-down/