In Va."s Eastern District, U.S. attorney's reach transcends geographic bounds "Former general Santoyo took bribes from terrorists - plain and simple," Neil H. MacBride, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, said after the sentencing. The quid pro quo here was money for information - and for terrorists, information is power. A 10-story federal courthouse a few blocks from Alexandria's historic Old Town district seems an unlikely spot for the case of a Colombian general who helped narco-terrorists in South America. But since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the federal prosecutor's office in Alexandria has become a hub for some of the highest-profile terrorism and national security cases in the country, from WikiLeaks and Somali pirates to the conviction of former CIA officer John Kiriakou. MacBride's prosecutors are currently working on cases that reach into more than 60 countries on six continents. Among the 94 U.S. attorneys" offices across the country, law enforcement officials say that the Alexandria office, with its 130 prosecutors, has raised its profile to the point where it rivals the Southern District of New York, which is famous for its financial fraud and terrorism cases. "Virginia is home to the Pentagon, CIA and the world's largest naval base," MacBride said in an interview. All that, plus our proximity to the nation's capital, means we're a national security bull's-eye. MacBride, 47, a University of Virginia law school graduate, has been U.S. attorney since 2009 and oversees a district that sprawls across one-third of the state and contains more than six million people. He arrived in his current job after prosecuting murder and drug cases as an assistant U.S. attorney in Washington and working for Vice President Biden when he was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs. When Eric H. Holder Jr. was appointed attorney general in 2009, he hired MacBride to be associate deputy attorney general and then promoted him to U.S. attorney, commending his "characteristic intelligence, diligence, humility and integrity." More recently, Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer praised MacBride's judgment and called him an "exceptional U.S. attorney." MacBride's office has used several characteristics of the Eastern District of Virginia to expand its jurisdiction to a wide variety of cases. One factor is geography. Northern Virginia is home to airports that cater to international travelers, particularly Dulles International. The CIA is based in Langley, and the Pentagon is just a few miles from MacBride's courthouse.