What’s Porn Got To Do With It?
What's Porn Got To Do With It?
What'southward Porn Got To Do With It?
Peradventure Attorney General Kathleen Kane is incompetent, in over her head…and the target of an ol' boys' network
Oct. 28, 2015
A few weeks agone, I was at a dinner political party and the talk turned to the soap opera-similar headlines surrounding our embattled chaser general Kathleen Kane. This was a civically engaged crowd; the people in attendance were readers of the New York Times and listeners of NPR. Yet, interestingly, nobody could quite summarize this tawdry tale. Cardinal words and phrases filled the air: "leaking one thousand jury testimony," "porn" and "misogyny" among them. Hazily, the prevailing media moving picture emerged: Our chief law enforcement officeholder was kinda loopy, an embittered woman threatening to reveal her enemies' pornographic emails in an "if I go down, we all go downwardly" narrative. Despite the fact that many were talking almost Kathleen Kane as the political equivalent of the deranged Glenn Close character in the film Fatal Allure, nobody could actually take a stride back and describe the story. Why had a duly elected attorney general been charged with crimes and had her license to exercise law revoked by an overstepping Supreme Court? And what does that take to do with all these porn emails we keep hearing well-nigh?
Hell, I was among the confused. I've been having a tough fourth dimension keeping it all straight. But terminal night, the Inquirer bankrupt a story most emails sent in 2022 by Sandusky grand jury Guess Barry Feudale to Inquirer reporters Angela Couloumbis and Craig McCoy. Of a sudden, things became a lot clearer. In these emails, Feudale was reportedly disquisitional of Kane while heaping lavish praise on then-prosecutor Frank Fina, the man behind the Sandusky prosecution and Kane'south nemesis. "Fina is the real deal," the judge wrote. "Vivid mind, photographic memory, tearing merely ethical advocate." The Inquirer quotes an unnamed source every bit describing the emails equally documenting "a conspiracy between Feudale and Fina" to leak data to the Inquirer. Just based on concluding night'due south Inquirer story, the relationship between Feudale and Fina—a judge and a prosecutor—does seem peculiarly cozy and, potentially, a kind of confirmation of one of the things Kathleen Kane has long maintained: That there is an ol' boys' network at play in the Commonwealth, and it'due south one with which she has had to contend since the day she took office.
I've been going dorsum and reading the daily drumbeat of the Kane stories for weeks now. I am by no means an expert on this case; in fact, the further you swoop in, the more inexpert yous feel. It's like beingness lost in a John Grisham novel, if John Grisham wrote almost center-anile state employees who shared raunchy porn via their piece of work computers.
Simply what emerges from the totality of the record is this likely conclusion: Every bit has become conventional wisdom, Kathleen Kane was undoubtedly in over her caput afterwards her improbable ascension from canton prosecutor to the state'southward top law enforcement official in her kickoff run for political office in 2012. Subsequently a get-go year of glowing headlines, Kane'south inexperience caught upward with her. She has been exposed as politically challenged and lacking in judgment. And, as her blood feud with Fina at the center of this story deepened, she has seemed blinded past seeking revenge—without possessing the political sleight-of-manus talents to deftly perform the act.
Diving into Porngate is like being lost in a John Grisham novel, if John Grisham wrote most eye-anile state employees who shared raunchy porn via their work computers.
Simply what as well seems articulate is that, at the aforementioned time, Kane has been targeted past an sometime boys' network thatmay have been bent on destroying her. Both things, in other words, can exist truthful: Kane wasn't ready to serve…and a cabal of enemies were dedicated to seeing that she didn't.
Here are the pertinent facts to proceed in mind that, taken together, lead to such a conclusion:
Kane ran confronting the part she sought to lead. Equally a candidate, Kane charged that the previous attorney full general, so-Governor Tom Corbett, had dragged his feet on the instance confronting child molester Jerry Sandusky due to political concerns. She promised to "investigate" the office'south investigation of Sandusky. A month subsequently existence sworn in, she did just that, hiring old prosecutor H. Geoffrey Moulton to look into why the Sandusky probe had taken more than two years to complete.
Information technology was star country prosecutor Fina who had led the Sandusky probe. It'due south likely that Fina and others in the office—Kane inherited a staff of over 700 employees—weren't thrilled at having their professionalism publicly questioned by someone campaigning to exist their dominate. Especially a woman who, by the manner, didn't take their level of experience; in fact, Kane had spent the last few years as a stay-at-dwelling mom, not fifty-fifty practicing law. Now hither she was, proclaiming the one thing that cuts true laic prosecutors to the quick: That, far from impartially seeking justice, they'd been playing politics.
Both things can exist truthful: Kane wasn't gear up to serve…and a cabal of enemies were defended to seeing that she didn't.
Kane signaled she was in possession of the porn. For a twelvemonth, there was no give-and-take on Moulton's investigation. Then, in February of 2014, Kane chosen a press conference to announce that Moulton'south piece of work had been stalled because the chaser full general'due south It department had been unable to find all the necessary emails roofing the period of the Sandusky probe. Only, she said, that was no longer the instance. They had at present recovered all emails sent and received past the prosecutors in her office, including while Corbett was AG.
Why is this significant? Kane might not have known information technology, simply at that moment she raised a red flag: Countless insiders in the Harrisburg legal and political universe now knew that she had admission to their porn emails.
That's how it'southward commonly referred to in the press: Porngate. Actually, by near accounts, the emails that a whole lot of judges, prosecutors and staffers had spent months and, in some cases, years sending to one some other went far beyond mere porn. I've only read accounts of them, simply words like "misogynistic" and "racist" take about ofttimes been fastened. There are images of animality, and "jokes" nearly secretaries performing oral sexual practice that seem straight out of the Mad Men era. Total disclosure: I like comedy that works blueish, but the descriptions of this cloth offends even my comedic sensibilities. We rely on judges and prosecutors for their judgment, and they giggle like pimply teens over this stuff?
Once Kane appear she had all these emails, Fina and the other men who had spent so much time bonding over this textile on the taxpayer dime had to know she had something on them. Within days, Fina requested and received a court order to prevent the release of any emails connected to the Sandusky review.
The empire strikes back? A few weeks subsequently, the Inquirer ran a folio 1 story detailing how, in the fall of 2013, Kane had refused to prosecute a sting operation Fina had run that included video of local and state officials taking bribes. It was a devastating story for Kane, making her look soft on political corruption. Many causeless that Fina was the source of the Inquirer story; Fina denies it.
Just Kane was certain Fina was behind the Inquirer story most her. She maintains that he was motivated past a desire to destroy her so the porn emails in her possession would never surface. In the state'south criminal complaint against her, Kane'south political consultant, quotes her as saying, "This is state of war" against Fina. (Fina had by now left the AG's part and was a prosecutor in Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams' part.)
I know you are only what am I? In June, 2014, the state alleges, Kane attempted her revenge. The Daily News ran a story most a case in which it appeared that the state's prosecutors—Fina, of course, and East. Marc Constanza—went soft on a criminal affair of their own, an investigation into the diplomacy of the tardily civil rights activist Jerry Mondesire. But trouble was that this story—unlike the ane about the sting case—required the leaking of grand jury information…which is a law-breaking.
Kane denies that she instructed anyone on her staff to break the law. Was Kane and so blinded by the need to exact revenge on Fina that the Democracy's chief law enforcement official intentionally broke the police force herself? Or did someone on her staff ready her up? To this day, Kane is estranged from many of her employees—including fifty-fifty her first deputy, Bruce Beemer—who not only are non loyal to her, merely actively dislike her for getting elected by essentially saying they sucked at their jobs. The criminal complaint makes clear that staffers of hers debate she told underlings to leak the story to the Daily News. But are they staffers with whom she'd been doing battle? Did they possibly transport the leak themselves, and let her take the blame?
And what about Fina? Could her arch enemy have brilliantly set a trap and lured Kane into a feud that somewhen led her to pause the law? After all, even earlier the Daily News story appeared, when reporters were merely making calls about the Mondesire example, information technology was Fina who went to Montgomery County judge William Carpenter, who oversees eastern Pennsylvania grand juries, and tipped him off that a k jury leak had probable occurred. In that location would be nothing illegal almost that on Fina'southward role. "Well played, sir," Machiavelli would say.
This is where the public record goes opaque. Ultimately, only a trial or a special prosecutor with amendment ability might exist able to determine which scenario is most authentic.
Back to the porn. In September of 2014, 6 months later on the Inquirer story chronicling Kane's decision not to prosecute the corruption case, and three months after the Daily News' Mondesire story, Kane released a sampling from the more than 1,000 sexually explicit emails and videos uncovered by Moulton'due south investigation. There were ii firings, two resignations and 23 attorney general employees reprimanded. Many others were swept abroad in Porngate, including Supreme Court Justice Seamus McCaffery, land Secretary of Environmental Protection Chris Abruzzo, and country Police Commissioner Frank Noonan.
Last fall, the Supreme Court seemed to go back to old boys' network primal casting when it hired former Commonwealth Courtroom Estimate Robert Byer to examine the emails. When it came to the emails of Supreme Court Justice Michael Eakin, Byer constitute just one containing "offensive sexual content." The Judicial Conduct Board also substantially cleared Eakin past declaring the emails so in question only "mildly pornographic." A new batch of emails released past Kane, however, shows they were far raunchier and more inappropriate than that.
Last calendar week, the Inky'due south Couloumbis and McCoy wrote that, past continuing to release the sordid emails, Kane has "proved the merit of a well-worked political adage: when in trouble, modify the subject field." They go on to write: "Her critics say the porn furor is irrelevant to her pending criminal trial."
That's sort of the animative question, isn't it? Kane says the "porn furor" is far from irrelevant to the charges confronting her. She argues that a conspiracy against her stems from her opponents' realization that they needed to destroy her before she could ruin their careers by releasing the offending emails. Given the sheer volume and breadth of these emails, and given just how many names in the statewide legal community are reportedly on them, and given the way judicial powers-that-exist seem unwilling to law their ain, is there are whatsoever incertitude that an old boys' network certainly exists in Harrisburg?
The Supreme Court went back to old boys' network central casting when it hired old Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Byer to examine Justice Eakin's emails and he plant just one containing "offensive sexual content."
Of course, it's tougher to bear witness whatsoever coordinated effort to set Kane up. Because what is too undeniable is that…
Kane has been her opponents ' best ally. Time and again, Kane has made decisions that play right into her opponents' hands. The examples of weirdness are likewise numerous to cover (like sending her twin sister equally a decoy to court to distract the press), but here is just a sampling:
- At one point, she requested a meeting with the Inquirer brass, only to show up with the legendary lawyer (and frequent Inquirer foe) Richard Sprague in tow. She didn't speak during the very coming together she had requested. It read like an amateur's endeavor at intimidation. Or, at the very least, the most tone deaf political motion imaginable.
- She has called for the release of the porn emails when, plain, information technology was in her ability to release them all forth, making it look like she favored transparency while yet hoarding material from public view.
- In an odd juxtaposition for someone supposedly taking on a cabal of sexist men, Kane named Jonathan Duecker as her chief of staff despite the fact that her own man resources department wanted to fire him afterward two female coworkers accused him of sexual harassment.
- Finally, in a rambling public statement in August after she was charged, Kane awkwardly took the opportunity to address her immature sons in a Knute Rockne-like pep talk that seemed either like a manipulative entreatment to jury pool emotion or simply tone deaf and weird. "If this is the style I take to communicate with my sons earlier I tin see them tomorrow, then I'grand going to do it," she said, before addressing them. "…I know, I mean, you're my sons and I know yous have compassion for other people and that you feel information technology'due south as much about justice as I practise. And while no 1 would blame you if you featherbed the fight, I hope that yous stay in information technology because I am staying in it. I dearest you boys and I'll meet you tomorrow."
Of course, none of this means Kathleen Kane is guilty, or not guilty. She may just be weird, or she may accept just come upwards against a much more skilled political histrion. Will nosotros ever know? The flood of emails have made i thing clear: Whether Kathleen Kane is guilty or non, the quondam boys' network is vast and good for you throughout the Republic.
Quondam Supreme Courtroom Chief Justice Ron Castille called this week for the Court to engage a special prosecutor to investigate Porngate. Just after reading through the record, it'due south hard to take confidence that the Pennsylvania judicial arrangement will ultimately paint a definitive picture of this entire baffling story. That'south why the Obama Justice Department needs to appoint a special prosecutor to look at the whole enchilada: Kane, Fina, the leaks, the emails…everything but Kane'southward kids, who sally as the only normal people in the whole sordid story.
Header photo: Collage Dan Shepelavy
Source: https://thephiladelphiacitizen.org/whats-porn-got-to-do-with-it/
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