He was only doing his job.
That was how U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter described his role as a private lawyer 20 years ago in getting low bail for Ira Einhorn, launching the hippie guru into 16 years on the lam in Europe.
Lawyer and radio talk-show host Michael A. Smerconish asked Specter yesterday if he had any regrets about his role in freeing Einhorn after Einhorn's arrest in 1979 in the killing of his girlfriend Helen "Holly" Maddux.
"I was doing my job as a lawyer," Specter said on the call-in show. "That's what a lawyer is supposed to do."
Einhorn, then 38, was arrested after Maddux's battered body was found in a trunk in Einhorn's apartment. She had been dead about 17 months, police said.
At a bail hearing before Common Pleas Judge William M. Marutani, Specter asked for bail for Einhorn of $5,000.
The district attorney's office asked for $100,000.
Marutani compromised and set bail at $40,000. Einhorn made the required 10 percent, was turned loose and soon fled the country.
That was the only time Specter represented Einhorn, who could not afford Specter's high fees.
Specter suggested that his successors in the DA's office have been less than diligent in going after Einhorn.
"The law has to be very tenacious in pursuing him and bringing him back to justice," he said.
"When I was district attorney, I didn't ask anyone else to do my job," Specter said. "The district attorney has a lot of power and a lot of leverage. I would be interested to know what kind of surveillance Einhorn is under." 
- John F. Morrison
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