CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A list of best practices issued amid national criticism over prosecutors’ handling of “Empire” actor Jussie Smollett’s case directly contradicts one aspect of the criminal probe into Cuyahoga County Armond Budish’s administration.

After the Smollett case garnered national criticism, the National District Attorney’s Association issued a list of best practices for handling sensitive, high-profile cases. The NDAA said the five recommendations outlined in its March 27 memo are intended to ensure the public’s confidence in sensitive, high-profile cases.

The NDAA’s best practices recommend that an entire prosecutor’s office should be removed from a case if the chief prosecutor recuses himself or herself.

“First, when a chief prosecutor recuses him or herself, the recusal must apply to the entire office, not just the elected or appointed prosecutor. This is consistent with best practices for prosecutors’ offices around the country,” the NDAA said.

A pair of Cuyahoga County assistant prosecutors and one of the county’s investigators are working on the case, even though Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost’s office took over the criminal investigation in January. Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Mike O’Malley recused himself from the case, but reached a deal with Yost’s office to keep the two assistant prosecutors and the investigator working on it.

Yost agreed to take oversight of the criminal investigation from O’Malley in a deal that allowed two Cuyahoga County assistant prosecutors, Matthew Meyer and Paul Soucie, as well as investigator Robert DeSimone to remain on the case. The three now work out of the Attorney General’s Cleveland office, instead of the Cuyahoga County Justice Center, and report to supervisors in Yost’s office instead of O’Malley.

Two weeks after Yost’s office took the case, investigators carried out a Feb. 14 raid at the county’s downtown headquarters and seized Budish’s cellphone, two computers and several boxes of documents.

Budish’s personal criminal lawyers, former U.S. Attorney Steve Dettelbach and criminal defense lawyer Larry Zukerman, have publicly argued that O’Malley’s entire office, including Meyer and Soucie, have a conflict of interest in the case.

Yost disagreed and defended the move in an interview with cleveland.com. Two law professors told cleveland.com that they did not see an immediate conflict with Meyer and Soucie based on publicly available information.

Dave O’Neil, a spokesman for Yost, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Zukerman said in a text message that Budish “and his team” agree with the NDAA’s recommendation.

When he was appointed U.S. Attorney in 2009, Dettelbach immediately recused himself from overseeing the federal corruption investigation that landed former County Commissioner Jimmy Dimora and dozens of other officials in prison. Dettelbach and Carole Rendon, his first assistant who would later become his successor, each worked for a law firm that had represented some key players before he took office. Barbara McQuade, U.S. attorney for eastern Michigan, stepped in to oversee the case.

But two assistant U.S. attorneys in Dettelbach’s office, Ann Rowland and Antoinette Bacon, stayed on the case under McQuade’s direction, a move that would have also contradicted the NDAA’s recent recommendations.

The NDAA released its statement establishing “prosecutorial best practices in high profile cases” after the Chicago-based Cook County State’s Attorney Office drew criticism when it announced it had dropped criminal charges that accused Smollett, a black, openly gay actor on the popular “Empire” series, of lying to police and faking a hate crime.

The statement also outlined four other best practices: a prosecutor should not take advice from politically connected friends of a defendant; any agreed diversion program or alternative-prosecution agreement should also require the defendant to admit responsibility for the action; Cook County attorneys should not have moved to expunge Smollett’s record of the crime so quickly; and hate crimes should be vigorously prosecuted and not subjected to higher burdens of proof “due to the misguided decisions of others.”

To comment on this story, please visit Tuesday’s crime and courts comments page.

Update: This post has been updated to include information about the previous corruption investigation into Cuyahoga County government.