Transparency News 12/23/16
Friday, December 23, 2016
Transparency News will return Dec. 27. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah and/or a relaxing weekend to you all!
Transparency News will return Dec. 27. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah and/or a relaxing weekend to you all!
State and Local Stories
All three Suffolk Circuit Court judges are planning to recuse themselves from a pending felony criminal case against a local lawmaker. Moreover, at least one of those judges — and likely all three of them — are expected to ask off a related case in which the Daily Press and two other local newspapers are pushing for access to a court stenographer's transcript of a closed hearing in the legislator's case last week, the lawyer representing the Daily Press said Thursday. That means that both the child cruelty case against Del. Rick Morris, R-Suffolk, and the media's pending challenge to being barred from the Dec. 15's hearing will likely be heard by a substitute judge from outside of Hampton Roads.
Daily Press
A defamation lawsuit filed by Michael Mann, a leading climate change researcher and a former University of Virginia professor, will continue against the National Review and the Competitive Enterprise Institute, as well as two writers, a Washington, D.C., appeals court ruled Thursday. However, the appeals court tossed out a portion of the suit that claimed defamation at the pen of an editorial writer for the National Review. Mann has claimed that the writers and publications, which excoriated him for his findings and use of climate data, defamed and libeled him by, among other things, referring to the Pennsylvania State University professor as “the Jerry Sandusky” of climate change. Sandusky was a Penn State football coach convicted of molesting children. The National Review and the Competitive Enterprise Institute accused Mann of trying to chill freedom of expression with the defamation suit and appealed a D.C. superior court ruling that denied their motion to dismiss. That led to the appeals court decision.
Daily Progress
National Stories
Metro’s Inspector General investigated a whistleblower complaint three years ago alleging that workers had falsified inspection reports involving bridges, platforms and tunnels. The watchdog also notified Metro’s management of the allegations, a spokeswoman for the mass-transit agency said this week. But what happened with those findings — or whether the August 2013 whistleblower complaint to the Office of Inspector General (OIG) triggered a broader review of the subway’s inspection practices — isn’t clear. Metro declined to release the report Thursday.
Washington Post
The House Intelligence Committee on Thursday released a 33-page report portraying the former intelligence contractor Edward J. Snowden, who in 2013 disclosed classified files about American surveillance operations, as a habitually disgruntled worker who damaged national security and has been in contact with Russian intelligence services in Moscow. The intelligence panel had released a three-page executive summary of its report in September ahead of the premiere of “Snowden,” a movie by the director Oliver Stone that portrayed him as a heroic whistle-blower. At the time, the more detailed report remained classified. The full report was not the result of an independent intelligence investigation by the committee. Rather, it was a review of the N.S.A.’s response to Mr. Snowden’s leaks and of the findings from an executive branch investigation. The committee said it did not conduct witness interviews, to avoid jeopardizing any future trial of Mr. Snowden. Important sections of the report remain redacted, including descriptions of the harms and risks to American troops it said Mr. Snowden’s actions had created. Also blacked out were any details backing the committee’s claim that since his “arrival in Moscow, he has had, and continues to have, contact with Russian intelligence services.”
New York Times
Back in 2011, MuckRock user Jason Smathers filed a FOIA with the CIA for all responses they had sent to requesters containing the term “record systems.” This was a reference to two earlier rejections he had received from the Agency, which cited the inability to preform a search in the system based on the terms Smathers had provided. In response, the agency sent him partially redacted copies of those same two rejections. Smathers immediately appealed, on grounds that it beggared belief that he had been the only requester to have ever had an exchange with the CIA that contained the words “record system.” Six years goes by, and we hear nothing from the Agency regarding this request. Then, just this week, this letter arrives in the mail. Which is worse? The casual admittance that they haven’t done anything for over half a decade, or unfathomable audacity of putting Smathers on deadline? And while two months sounds pretty generous, keep in mind that they’ve been sitting on this for 72 months - a mere 36 times what they’re giving him.
Muck Rock
Editorials/Columns
Massage therapists probably were working overtime at the Fairfax County Government Center two weeks back: Elected officials and staff were straining muscles as they patted themselves on the back for a series of accountability and transparency reformsforced upon them in the wake of one of the biggest scandals in county history. The proposals made by the reform panel and accepted by the supervisors appear, on the face of things, to be reasonable. But it will be up to the county government – from the bottom up and from the top down – to ensure that public trust is restored. Merely patting oneself on the back isn’t going to be enough. Only time will tell.
Alexandria Sun Gazette
Daily Press
A defamation lawsuit filed by Michael Mann, a leading climate change researcher and a former University of Virginia professor, will continue against the National Review and the Competitive Enterprise Institute, as well as two writers, a Washington, D.C., appeals court ruled Thursday. However, the appeals court tossed out a portion of the suit that claimed defamation at the pen of an editorial writer for the National Review. Mann has claimed that the writers and publications, which excoriated him for his findings and use of climate data, defamed and libeled him by, among other things, referring to the Pennsylvania State University professor as “the Jerry Sandusky” of climate change. Sandusky was a Penn State football coach convicted of molesting children. The National Review and the Competitive Enterprise Institute accused Mann of trying to chill freedom of expression with the defamation suit and appealed a D.C. superior court ruling that denied their motion to dismiss. That led to the appeals court decision.
Daily Progress
National Stories
Metro’s Inspector General investigated a whistleblower complaint three years ago alleging that workers had falsified inspection reports involving bridges, platforms and tunnels. The watchdog also notified Metro’s management of the allegations, a spokeswoman for the mass-transit agency said this week. But what happened with those findings — or whether the August 2013 whistleblower complaint to the Office of Inspector General (OIG) triggered a broader review of the subway’s inspection practices — isn’t clear. Metro declined to release the report Thursday.
Washington Post
The House Intelligence Committee on Thursday released a 33-page report portraying the former intelligence contractor Edward J. Snowden, who in 2013 disclosed classified files about American surveillance operations, as a habitually disgruntled worker who damaged national security and has been in contact with Russian intelligence services in Moscow. The intelligence panel had released a three-page executive summary of its report in September ahead of the premiere of “Snowden,” a movie by the director Oliver Stone that portrayed him as a heroic whistle-blower. At the time, the more detailed report remained classified. The full report was not the result of an independent intelligence investigation by the committee. Rather, it was a review of the N.S.A.’s response to Mr. Snowden’s leaks and of the findings from an executive branch investigation. The committee said it did not conduct witness interviews, to avoid jeopardizing any future trial of Mr. Snowden. Important sections of the report remain redacted, including descriptions of the harms and risks to American troops it said Mr. Snowden’s actions had created. Also blacked out were any details backing the committee’s claim that since his “arrival in Moscow, he has had, and continues to have, contact with Russian intelligence services.”
New York Times
Back in 2011, MuckRock user Jason Smathers filed a FOIA with the CIA for all responses they had sent to requesters containing the term “record systems.” This was a reference to two earlier rejections he had received from the Agency, which cited the inability to preform a search in the system based on the terms Smathers had provided. In response, the agency sent him partially redacted copies of those same two rejections. Smathers immediately appealed, on grounds that it beggared belief that he had been the only requester to have ever had an exchange with the CIA that contained the words “record system.” Six years goes by, and we hear nothing from the Agency regarding this request. Then, just this week, this letter arrives in the mail. Which is worse? The casual admittance that they haven’t done anything for over half a decade, or unfathomable audacity of putting Smathers on deadline? And while two months sounds pretty generous, keep in mind that they’ve been sitting on this for 72 months - a mere 36 times what they’re giving him.
Muck Rock
Editorials/Columns
Massage therapists probably were working overtime at the Fairfax County Government Center two weeks back: Elected officials and staff were straining muscles as they patted themselves on the back for a series of accountability and transparency reformsforced upon them in the wake of one of the biggest scandals in county history. The proposals made by the reform panel and accepted by the supervisors appear, on the face of things, to be reasonable. But it will be up to the county government – from the bottom up and from the top down – to ensure that public trust is restored. Merely patting oneself on the back isn’t going to be enough. Only time will tell.
Alexandria Sun Gazette
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