Henry v MOA: Questioning Styles, GPS, Best Practices, And Sexual Assault Cases

Sorry this has taken a while for me to get this post about Friday up.  I figured it could wait til Saturday, since there's no court over the weekend.  And the more time I took the less confusing my post would be.  Though the attorneys have to write briefs requesting this and that and opposing what the other side wants as well as prepping for their questions for the witnesses.  Judge Beistline has piles (literally) of documents to read as well as writing jury instructions.

Witnesses - Friday, Nov 2, 2018

Dennis Wheeler, former Municipal Attorney cont from yesterday Aaron Whitt - APD GPS expert Philip Deming - Outside Expert on Workplace Investigations Kenneth McCoy - Dept Chief, was in SVU (Special Victims Unit

Plaintiff's Goals

Each day the goals should get more in focus.  But often new lines of reasoning are introduced.  So I keep writing these in hopes that at the end, I can use them as notes to mesh them all.

With Friday's witnesses, plaintiff continues to hammer away at the credibility of the Brown Report.  Here are some of the lines of logic the plaintiff attorneys seem to be trying to embed in the minds of the jurors:

• The Brown Report was one-sided and incomplete
• Brown got the 'bombshell' (a word they like to tack on a lot) allegations, but not the eventual outcomes.  Those outcomes showed there was really little or nothing behind the allegations (this is all according to the plaintiff)
• All the information Brown got was provided by people who wanted to get rid of Henry - APD Command, the Law Department, SGT Jack Carson and his perhaps unwitting sidekick Seth McMillan, and Lt. Kevin Vandegriff
• What Henry told Sen. Katkus didn't stop any investigations because 
• there were no big drug or sex rings in the National Guard
• Katkus knew these things before Henry told him
• The media attention to the National Guard abuse allegations was implicating the lack of action by APD and it was impacting the gubernatorial race, which included Anchorage Mayor Dan Sullivan running for Lt Gov, so finding a scapegoat (Henry) was the real reason for going after him.

They're also trying to get the jury to believe that

• Jack Carson was the source of much of the 'salacious' (another plaintiff favorite word) allegations about the Guard Recruiters because he suspected his wife of having an affair with a recruiter.  This led him to go after Anthony Henry 
• first, for 'leaking' information about a 'confidential informant' to Katkus.  
• Then other complaints about Henry, mainly around protecting Jason Whetsell when he was diagnosed with MS.
• Then feeding Rick Brown, the investigator, false and/or incomplete stories about Henry during the investigation.

Remember, I'm not saying these allegations are true or false, but merely listing what the plaintiff is trying to prove.  The defense is working to demonstrate these allegations are false.  Mostly, the plaintiffs have made their case, since they went first.  But that ended Wednesday, and now the defense is bringing its witnesses forward.  

This overview doesn't include lots of the twists and turns I'm still trying to sort through to figure out where they belong or whether they really matter.  There is no video of someone committing a crime.  No dead bodies.  So each side has been trying to recreate what happened and what was inside people's heads, by going through forests of  documents - police reports, memos, transcripts of interviews, GPS data to determine where a police car (or its driver) were at different times, depositions (most about two years old) - to prove or disprove what witnesses say in court.  And as important as the computer is, both sides have real volumes* and volumes of notebooks with all the briefs filed in this case.

I think the above is probably the important stuff for casual readers to know.  Going through the maze of claims and counterclaims and the documents and videos they're using to argue their cases is not only impossible for me here (no way I can recreate three weeks of trial (so far) that goes eight hours a day), and is probably not worth your time.  What is worth your time is:

1.  Understanding the basic narratives of both parties
2.  Understanding a few of the battles over details
3.  Getting a sense of how the attorneys are doing this

So the rest of this post is going to dip into parts of the trial to help me illustrate my impressions.

Wheeler - Questioning gets more [Fill in the blank], Wheeler stands his ground a little better.  

I first wrote 'hyperbolic' in the blank, but it's not the right word.  Ray Brown, and to a lesser extent, Meg Simonian,  Anthony Henry's main attorneys, use a technique that is similar to Donald Trump's.  It's full of insinuations, mischaracterizations, and name calling delivered in a demeaning and often sarcastic tone.  While I think there are some witnesses who are so evasive and guilty that this technique may be the only way to break through their facade, it's also a way to confuse and intimidate most witnesses who are basically  honest and decent. It also makes the witness look unreliable.  It's a way ruthless interrogators get false confessions.  And in this case, it's a way to plant ideas into jurors' heads, like "Crooked Hillary" and "Lyin' Ted" and they work for the same reason.

My second day experience in this trial was the video deposition of Rick Brown, the author of the Brown Report.  Ray Brown, the attorney, was using this technique on Rick Brown, who essentially fell apart.  But now that I've had a chance to see this technique used repeatedly, I'm no longer so sure about my assessment of Rick Brown.  Was it based on an accurate perception or was I, like Rick Brown, bamboozled by Ray Brown's garage of insinuations and mischaracterizations.  I don't know.  I understand we will see Rick Brown again - I'm not sure if he'll be in court in the flesh or in the defense's video deposition.

Dennis Wheeler, Dan Sullivan's Municipal Attorney, didn't do well on Thursday afternoon.  But he must have gotten some coaching on how to stand up to Ray Brown for Friday morning's attack.  I'd note here, before looking at a bit of Friday, that I found out what the Ray Brown's comment was all about.  I was getting fatigued  - this trial and these posts are costing me sleep and by the afternoon I'm losing my concentration at times - and I stopped typing.  And, apparently, stopped listening carefully.  But I did turn myself back on and typed:

RB:  You’re testifying under oath today, sir!

Just before this, Wheeler had been asked about Deputy Municipal Attorney Blair Christiansen's role in helping Rick Brown write his report.  Was it just editorial or more substantial?  Wheeler apparently said, just editorial, but then corrected himself and said, more substantial.  (Sorry I don't have the exact exchange.) That's when the admonishment about being under oath came in.  

Now, for Friday, here's an example of a bit of Brown's questioning of Wheeler.  Remember, Brown talks about three times normal talking speed, and my fingers do ok when someone talks half normal talking speed - like the defense's attorney Sean Halloran.  So I'm only capturing the basic idea of the question, not all the insinuations and questionable assumptions embellishing the question.  So where Wheeler says, "I disagree with everything you said" you have to imagine a lot more was packed into the question than I captured.

RB:  Did you tell Vandegriff to start a parallel investigation?  W:  My charge was to assist Mr. BrownRB:  He started a parallel investigation,  you should have read the report.  W:  Disagree with everything you said. RB:  IA (internal Affairs)  policies didn’t apply to this?  W:  Wasn’t an IA investigation.RB: Did you know Chief Mew was asked to make a time line?  W:  I didn’t know he was asked to make a time line.  I know he made one.RB:  You were too busy with all the other stuff you were doing, weren't you?RB:  He was making a Toohey request asking to see K’s phone log and emaiL Did you know that? You didn't did you?  W:  I RB:  Did you know that ??? Being advised the whole time?   

W::Didn’t know that.RB:  Did you know Carson and McMillan made the Chief's time line?  W:  I didn’t know thatRB:  Did you know that they relied on the Blaylock Manifesto?  [Manifesto is Brown's description.  Blaylock is supposed to be a witness next week so we'll see if he's the crazy guy that Brown's described him as, or a legitimate whistleblower. Here are the allegations he made early on, or, as Brown says, The Manifesto.]
W:  I didn’t know that.RB:  Did you know that Blair Christiansen did day-to-day help with Brown? W:  I assigned her to do thatRB:  Four years is a long time to remember.  So you can't remember thisRB:  It should be clear that if this was a large scale national guard drug ring and transport of drugs, that you would remember wouldn't you?   RB:  There was no evidence, none, it should be clear, it should be clear this should have been about the Guard.  W:  You’re making assumptions that I can’t speak to sir.

You can see Wheeler has picked up some strategies for responding.  I had thought about how would I answer if I were questioned like this on the stand.  I think you have to stay calm and say variations of, "which  of those questions do you want me to answer?"  To the extent that jurors start putting themselves into the shoes of the witnesses, Brown's attacks may start eliciting sympathy for the witnesses.  I also couldn't help but think, "Wow, being a trial lawyer is one of the professions that allow bullies to practice their skills and get rewarded for it.  Like drill sergeants." Let me be clear here, I have no evidence that Brown is like this outside the courtroom.

[UPDATE Sat Nov 3, 2018  8:45pm:  I forgot to mention, that Ray Brown tried to get Wheeler over to the Feliciano/Kennedy trial again Friday.  He asked Wheeler how Anthony Henry first came to his attention.  Wheeler said, Another case.  Brown asked, "Which case?"  Wheeler got out "Feliciano/Kennedy" when Parker objected and the had a sidebar with the judge.  When Brown resumed his questions it was on a different topic.  I don't know what the judge said, but it would seem he told him to move on.]

Aaron Whitt:  Thorough Knowledge Of Technical Topic Gets Whitt Past Brown

Writing that title, made me think of this as a video game, and Brown is one of the obstacles you have to get past before you go on to the next level.  

Whitt is the APD expert on the GPS tracking systems in the APD patrol cars.  Jason Whetsell's awol charges were based on GPS data.  In his testimony Whetsell claimed that the system wasn't all that good 

Whetsell:  There were errors of other people showing 4 hours at intersection.  (Oct 22, 2018)

So the defense brought in Whitt to explain when the data became reliable.  He knew his stuff and responded in a strong, confident voice.  He was not intimidated by Brown.  Brown used his appearance to try to find out why there were no data to be able to confirm Henry's claims of where he was at specific times.  Brown said that Henry asked for the GPS data, but was told it wasn't available.  So Brown tried to figure out the timing compared to what Whitt was saying about when the system became useable.  For Henry's request the parts of the system weren't all linked - you needed to know the car number, the modem number, who was assigned to the car, and who was actually driving it on a particular day, and that information wasn't all connected or captured anywhere according to Whitt.


Philip Deming - Outside Expert on Workplace Investigations

Mr. Deming was brought in to prove that their hired investigator, Rick Brown, did what he was supposed to do.  Deming listed all his degrees, special trainings and certificates, and national associations.  You can see for yourself at his consulting website.  One of his jobs is to give expert testimony like this.  He was dressed and spoke well and his hair was perfect. It was as though the make-up people got him ready before he came into the room. 

Deming outlined the best practices for an internal investigation like this.  He told the jury to imagine he had a split screen in front of him - on one screen, gestured with his hand, would be the best practices and on the other what Rick Brown actually did.  Then he went through the steps of the best practices to compare.  

Step 1:  should org conduct?  In this case allegations about Henry's behavior
Step 2:  whether org should undertake, if so certain procedures,
Step 3:  selection of investigator or fact finder - looking for qualities of investigators for this kind of engagement - workplace investigation MOA, police department - different skill set from someone not familiar with police - they did one, and then two  Mr. Vakalis charged Wheeler to get investigator based on quals - law enforcement background, aware of practices of investigation
Step 3:  the interview  - making sure has best practices protocol - this fact finder, interviewed 

As you can see I lost a step or two of this.  For each step after saying what you should do,  he described what the MOA actually did.  And he blessed the investigation.

Simonian (for Henry) then began to ask what parts of the Report Deming had actually looked at.  The 97 pages and some attachments.  Did he look at the tapes or transcripts?  No.  Then how do you know he said the required things for an interview?  Stepping back, here's what he'd told the defense attorney Halloran:

Step 3:  the interview  - making sure has best practices protocol - this fact finder, interviewed 17 people, identical in how introduced self and allegations - whether disclosure to non?? Personal   had impact in terms of victim participation.  Then he followed a prescribed process for govt orgs - Garrity pre interview admonishment - advisory of what required of employee: 1.  Must cooperate with fact finder , truthful not evasive  2.  They have constitutional rights not to incriminate themselves.  Doc signed by interviewee and fact finder.  Interview recorded.  Format with formal questions What is your name? You're aware I’m recording? How long a police officer?. 

But, asked Simonian, if you didn't look at the tapes, how do you know he did all these things? And then in what I thought was a good touch, Simonian asked him to look at the split screen, and she moved her hands like he had to point out the two imaginary screens.  

Simonian:  He used proper - Split screen - . . .
Deming:  in the summary it describes what he did in the interview process
S:  Doesn’t show how he opened the interviews etc.
S:  Today as witness you only get to . . .
S:  Based on what was in the report, you took his word for it without looking to see.
D: Read the report multiple times, professional interviewer.
Done.  No redirect
1:31pm
Judge to jury: Expert witness not providing opinion that’s for you to determine.  

He was just there to assure that Brown used the 'best practices' procedures, but not to voice an opinion on what he found and concluded.

Simonian asked how much he charged.  What I understood was $23,000.  That sounds like a lot.  Well it is.  But in the world of professional consulting, it's not all that much.  Expert witnesses charge anywhere from $200 on up per hour.  At, say, $500 per hour, he just needed to spend 46 hours on this.  Reading the report really carefully could take ten hours or more.  Analyzing it and writing up a report - well I've already spent several hours on this post you're reading alone.  Then flying up and testifying in court.  It goes fast.  The irony is that it's only $7000 less that Rick Brown was paid for the whole investigation and report.  I've always thought that organizations should bargain better with 'experts' about their rates.  I don't think they got $23,000 worth from Deming.  Maybe as consultants go, but not compared to other things the MOA could spend its money on.   Even though he did a good job of presenting, I think Simonian raised enough questions to leave some doubts in jurors' minds.

Kenneth McCoy - Dept Chief, was in SVU

The last witness of the day was the APD deputy chief.  He has spent a lot of his career specializing in sexual assault and rape investigation.  He was there to present a list of 27 reports of sexual assault and/or rape cases that came out of internal National Guard 15-6 Investigations.  The details describe in some related to getting alcohol for underage girls who were potential National Guard recruits and luring them to parties and sex.  They were pretty lurid and supply some factual basis for the allegations we were all hearing through the media (or from Guard members we knew) back then, and counter the plaintiff's early arguments that "there's nothing here, keep walking."

But as Simonian went through the cases with McCoy, he wasn't able to identify which cases were prosecuted.  Some of the victims didn't want the case to go forward.  Others were outside of Anchorage so were sent to the State Troopers.  I understood, though I'm not sure from what, that many of the perpetrators were separated from the National Guard.  And McCoy, very professionally, said he from the documents available he couldn't tell more.

So what we got here was further information on the cases that came out of the investigations of the sexual abuse at the National Guard.  While the plaintiff's arguments to various witnesses that "there were no prosecutions form any of this"  may not be wrong, per se, it doesn't reflect that there were 27 seemingly credible complaints, even if the victims didn't want to take them further, ("I'd just gotten divorced, I had kids, I was working in the Guard, it just didn't seem like it was a good idea to pursue this"  McCoy quoted one victim.)

In some cases the conditions for a good prosecution weren't there.  Other cases were too old.  After McCoy was finished being a witness, and the jury was out of the room, Simonian argued to the judge that she needed more police reports to document what happened in each case, because she didn't want the defense to argue that they weren't prosecuted because Henry's meeting with Katkus caused the investigations to be delayed.  The documents, she said, had been asked for in discovery, but never came.

Monday witnesses  

Rick Brown and Myron Fanning.  I'm not sure if Brown is coming in person or we're just going to see a video of the defense's deposition of Brown.  We saw a lot of Rick Brown in the video of the plaintiff's deposition.

Myron Fanning is was a Deputy Chief who has been mentioned frequently in the trial.  He was part of 'the Command' that was feuding with Lt. Henry.

OK, that gives you an overview of what I got out of Friday in Courtroom 3 at the Federal Building.  (Writing that reminds me that the trial goes on next week and anyone who can get through security, can attend, if you want to see what it's like.  It starts at 8:30am and goes on til 4:30 or 5:00.  Don't bring a camera or audio recorder that's separate from your phone to get through security.)

*something I learned writing this post:

"Volumn used to be the correct spelling for a series – such as a series of movies or books. Therefore Volumn 1, Volumn 2, Volumn 3, etc.
Volumn is now not used at all and volume now covers all scenario’s. In fact volumn is no longer in any dictionaries and as I type this the spell checker flags it as an error. The ultimate proof of its extinction is type volumn into Google and it will come back with… Did you mean volume." (from WHYHOWCOME?)

You can get to an index of all posts on this trial at the Henry v MOA tab under the blog header at top.  Or click here. 

Henry v MOA - Drug Day And What Is The Plaintiff Trying To Do?

[I've started a new tab on top - Henry v MOA - so you can find all the posts on this topic.]

I feel like I've walked into the tar pits and the case is sucking me under.  The still mild weather at least allows me exercise and some time with trees as I ride to and from court.  I'd show pictures, but the security at the court told me not to bring my camera any more because I'm not allowed to take it into the court section of the Federal Building and they aren't allowed to hold it for me - as they did last time I covered a trial and for the first few days.  I think it's because I got out late the other day and it was locked in overnight and others asked about it. The next day they wanted to give it back to me in the morning.  But I was going into court.  Should I hide it in the bushes in the atrium?  Sorry, can't take it to my car because I'm on my bike.  We need you to take it by noon.  I found someone in court who could take it out to his car at noon and I got it after court was over.  So now I have to leave it at home.  And no, I only have what someone called a 'smart enough' phone,  I don't think it takes pictures.  But yes, people can take their smart phones up.  I also learned they now have wifi in the court area.  I'm trying not use it.  One of the benefits of going to the trial is not having access to the internet.

I'm writing all this because it's much easier than trying to write about what happened in the courtroom.  First, I got there late, so I missed the finishing up of Ann Kirklund, the FBI agent. She was a great witness yesterday, very credible and I'm sorry I missed her testimony this morning.  I thought they were going to put on the economist to talk about how he calculated the backpay and pension award should Henry win his case.  I had gone to Karen Hunt's OLE class on the 2nd Amendment.  That was interesting.  OK, I need to get to the task at hand.

I got into court around 11am.  The new witness was taking the stand - Joseph Hazelaar.  (The name was hard for me to keep in my head so I looked it up.  It means hazel or hazel wood in Dutch.)

But before getting into details, let me try to outline what I'm starting to see as the strategy of Anthony Henry's attorneys  Since I didn't get to the first several days of the trial,  I missed the opening arguments which, presumably, would have spelled this out.  So I have to tease it out from the myriad details that my gut says we are hearing repeated way too much.  Today I heard Ray Brown ask the exact same questions about an hour apart.  But I'm sure there's a reason that I don't yet fathom.

Anyway, here's my overview based on what I've seen since last Friday.

Basically, Henry’s legal team is trying to disprove the allegations against Henry that came out in the Brown Report.  They are doing it by:

1.  Disputing facts:
1. That telling Gen Katkus about a National Guard member who was a drug suspect did NOT make the drug investigation ‘go sideways’
1. Showing that the drug investigation continued very successfully after Katkus was informed 
2. Informants continued cooperating
2. That what Henry did (informing Katkus) was completely normal and followed procedures
2. Trying to show that certain APD officers - particularly Jack Carson - ran a rogue investigation of the Guard and filed false allegations against Henry
3. Showing that Investigator Rick Brown was NOT an independent investigator, but rather was a captive of people in the Muni who wanted to get evidence to terminate Henry, particularly Jack Carson and  Asst Municipal Attorney Blair Christiansen.  AND that Rick Brown wasn’t competent to do the study.
4. Showing that Carson had personal reasons for wanting to go after the National Guard and harass Henry with complaints.   

These are things that seemed likely based on (mostly) today's testimony.

The Municipality of Anchorage is the defendant, but in a sense, Anthony Henry is on trial, or perhaps on appeal of the decision the Municipality made to terminate him.  So, he has to prove MOA made an incorrect  decision.

To do that, they have to drag  the jury through a mire of details.  And the jury has to see how each of the seemingly random bits of information come together to make the case.  The problem I'm having is figuring out which of the many details we're going through are directly relevant to proving their points, which are necessary to understand those directly relevant points, and which are just distracting.

For example, here are a few of the details I got to sit through today:

1. Technical stuff about how FBI, APD, DEA, State Troopers coordinate through the Safe Street program and a program that seems to overlap with Safe Streets called OCDETF. (They pronounce it something like “Ocidet”).  It stands for Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force.   This seems to be in there to make the point there was only one investigation of drugs at the National Guard, and thus Jack Carson's claims that there was a separate one at SAU (Special Assignments Unit) at APD (Anchorage Police Department) would be false.  
2. Understand more about how the task force with different jurisdictions work.  Again this seems aimed at delegitimizing Jack Carson.
3. Technical details for processing suspects and requirements for recording interviews. Aimed at showing why Carson's claims were false.
4. Jurisdictional issues like APD wouldn’t pick up $7000 in drug money in Glenallen, because it’s outside their jurisdiction, so troopers would do it, or why they would be collecting the money.  I’m not sure, but I understood it to be related to working with informants and supplying drugs for an outlying area that can’t afford to buy large amounts, so they wait to collect it after the person sells it.  Someone (Carson again?) claimed an APD officer did this.
5. How much cocaine would stay an APD case, and how much would go to the FBI Task Force.  Little stuff stays in Anchorage, big stuff to FBI.  To delegitimize Carson's claims the SAU was also investigating.
6. FBI would have to get permission from Headquarters to investigate a high level official like a General.  Why Henry, as part of the FBI run task force, couldn't do an undercover investigation of General Katkus on his own.  I think.
7. Drug deals happening more in parking lots, because police get search warrants for houses. Random, not essential for the case, I think.
8. Background on Jack Carson  To explain his motive.
9. Undercover agents don’t see the confidential informants they manage in person very often, but frequently by phone. Random? And they don’t last long in that relationship. To dispute Carson's claims that telling Katkus ended the informant's cooperation.
10. A jumpout is a drug bust with lots of unmarked cars. There was a big one at the Debarr Costco parking lot in 2010.  Show that the operation didn't die after Katkus was informed.
11. You need a Glass Warrant if you are state or local law enforcement before you do an audio recording of someone who doesn’t know you’re law enforcement.  I think again to dispute Carson.

I'd note, I made the list of details, by going through my rough trial notes from today. But then I added the italics as I tried to see if I could connect the detail with one of their goals.  The exercise was illuminating to me.  It's mostly aimed at Jack Carson.  I did hear Herny's attorney say they will not call Carson as a witness.  Is he also on the defense's list.  He's someone I want to see for myself.  He's turning out to be the villain of the plaintiff's story.


Today, from a different perspective.  As I said somewhere up above, when I came in Joseph Hazelaar was being sworn in.

I think it's easiest to just give you my rough notes for his background.  They're abbreviated, but a much better option than the long tedious testimony that dragged out until 4:30 when the judge dismissed the jury.  I've combined the questions and the answers so I could keep up.

"Born?  grew up? in Virginia,  HS diploma
14 years in law enforcement
State Troopers, DEA, FBI
4 years in Fairbanks, patrol officer.
Transferred out to Bethel 2004, first drug ring
Training?  Canine handler, OJT, then started sending me to academies
Undercover or as detective?  Both
Dependent on case  - rural Alaska no real undercover, might bring people in temporarily as undercover
DEA 2006 transferred to major offenders, high level drug, the 2007 assigment with DEA to 2010.  Transferred to APD.  Coming out of DEA, not wanting to go back to troopers, Capt. Mallard thinking of assign with cooperation with APD.  To work under Lt. Henry at APD.  Into SAU Special Assignment Unit
Clearance, deputized for DEA, doesn’t cross over to FBI
How long in SAU til full fledged? - on paper around April, still had limited access, still reporting to Annie Kirklund, About April 2010.
Stil police officer?  No.  Self- employed, Fire arms industry.  [I think that's what he said]
Still have contact with law enforcement.  Yes
Terminated?  No
Terminated from Troopers?  April 13, 2011
Rehired?  April 2013
Investigation going on?  Rehired you following investigation?  Remained trooper a while?  Year and a half?
Terminated again?  Yes, I could not hold my Alaska Police Standards Certificate.
Finding against you of dishonesty?  Yes sir."

OK, so he lost his Alaska Police Standards Certificate for dishonesty.  When I looked up the meaning of his name I also got the decision about his certificate.

He also talked in detail about his undercover work, including a meeting with a representative of a Mexican drug cartel.

When he was questioned by Ray Brown for the plaintiff Henry, he was a very credible witness, answering quickly, articulately.  Seemed to know a lot of details.  But when he was questioned by the defense attorney Doug Parker, his yesses and nos got crisper and tighter.  And he couldn't remember as well. He looked like he was trying to calculate what Parker was tricking him into saying. And a couple of times he seemed to get riled a bit and pushed back with attitude.  Nothing remarkable, but enough to show that calm facade wasn't who this person always is.

And as he testified, I began thinking.  Here's a guy whose job (as undercover agent) depended on his ability to lie convincingly.  But also outside that job, he'd lied enough to get caught and to lose his police certificate.  Jury, be careful here.  (Of course, that's rhetorical since the jury aren't allowed to listen to any news about the trial.)

How much more detail do you want?  Because I'm running out of steam.  I hinted at a lot with my list of details.  Here's something that got me thinking.  Hazelaar told the story of having a confidential informant connect hm up the chain to a high level drug dealer. The names of the people who gave names and the people who were named were discussed in court.  I don't know what happened to the people involved (I asked and was told he couldn't reveal that.)  But I wondered what would happen if word got out to the guy who was informed on.  The names were originally redacted in the documents filed with the court before the trial, but in the trial they are all being discussed.  One attorney told me they had to because using initials was too confusing for the attorneys and the jury.  But I wonder.  I suspect no one is going to publish the names (I'm not) and they will never find out.

He also explained why the drug investigation had to be sped up around the time Henry told General Katkus there was a drug dealer in the National Guard.  It wasn't because  Katkus tipped people off to hide the drugs.  Rather, they had put a tracker and gps on the target's car.  But he found out right away.  How?  He took his tires in to be changed and the mechanic found it.  So lesson learned;  don't put trackers on cars when it's time to change to or from snow tires.  The mechanic thought it was a bomb.


This post sort of wanders from subject to subject, and from one style to another.  In that sense, it gives you an idea of what court feels like.  But I hope it was easier to follow.  It's certainly takes less of your time.

Henry v. MOA - Henry's Attorney Destroys Author of Brown Report

A trial builds.  A victory one day seems less important after a few more witnesses.  But this afternoon in court I heard a withering barrage of disparaging questions that Rick Brown didn't have good answers for. This was a bit confusion, because Ray Brown - one of Anthony Henry's attorneys - asked the questions of Rick Brown, the 'consultant' hired by the Municipality in 2014.  Also, this didn't happen live in court.  It was a video of Rick Brown's deposition.  Also, we haven't heard the Municipal Attorney's cross examination of Rick Brown.

Basically, at the end of the day - and there are 50 minutes of that tape left for Tuesday - Rick Brown appeared:
1.  Unprepared for an investigation this complex.
2.  To rely on a few people as his trusted guides to the APD and Alaska National Guard
3.  Set up to target Anthony Henry as though his job was to show he was the bad guy and so he was biased from the beginning to believe things said about Henry, but not believe Henry
4.  Reliant on interviews for information
5  Not to have sought much verification
6.  Overly reliant on Dep. Municipal Attorney Christiansen and reworded the final report to reflect things she wanted him to put in, even though, as Ray Brown asserted, and Rick Brown didn't answer very effectively, he hadn't actually found information to support the allegation

Some possible explanations for Rick Brown's poor performance:
1.  He was jet lagged from flying to Anchorage (I don't recall any details of when the deposition took place.  I suspect it might have been on the video, but from where I sat, I couldn't read it - or how long he was here for the deposition.  I'm even assuming it took place in Anchorage.
2.  He just was out of his depth in doing an investigation like this
3.  He was here to collect a fee and give the MOA whatever they wanted
4.  Other?

Just to give you a sense of the deposition, I've copied just a short snipped of my rough notes.  I cleaned them up a bit - it went really fast and I didn't label which Brown was talking, hoping I'd remember from the context.  And in this section I think it worked.  Remember this is not verbatim or complete, just as much as I could get in the rapid fire questions. Q=Attorney Ray Brown, A= Witness Rick Brown.  I've missed some exact details, but this gives a sense of what the deposition was like:

Q: Did APD reports you received mention the Natl Guard?  Did they mention investigation into other members of the Natl Guard?   Did you ever see documents provided by anyone besides Carson, McMillan, Steve Payne that they were investigating anyone in NG other than EP?
A: Yes.  Not investigating but going to look to see if anything was there.
Q:  Your report says Henry was being deceptive to you because he had stopped one case going forward because he disclosed it to Katkus.  You say the case that dried up.  What part dried up?
A:  EP said he had the ability to transport drugs in military vehicles.
Q:  Did you ever hear that from EP?  Only person you heard that from was Jack Carson, right?
A:  Can’t remember if him alone or also McMillan.  Not 100% sure.  All audios of all EP contacts tape recorded.  Listened to all the interviews.
Q:  To explanation of scope of his drug dealing?  Nothing in any of these audios that suggests he could move drugs in NG vehicles.  If you're investigator, that’s pretty big stuff to know.  Never saw it from EP’s mouth.  Wouldn’t that be important to document?  Especially if others ….
You talked to "P" directly, could have asked him when it occurred, if he continued to cooperate with the investigation.  Was there any info that he stopped cooperating with SAU, FBI, Safe street?
A:  Early March he stopped cooperating.
Q:  Who told you that?  Let me guess - Jack Carson.
A:  Carson or McMillan.  He quit cooperating with SAU investigation.
Q:  What did he stop cooperating in?
A:  I had no ability to investigate the NG.  Cooperating with SAU investigation
Q:  Any evidence that he cooperated?  Wouldn’t it be helpful to have evidence?
Did you look at the police report?
A:  Yes Reports with # Feb 23, 2010.
Q:  What did EP stop doing?
A:  Early March stopped cooperating.
Q:  From Feb to March?  Did you interview - Carson and MacMillan wasn’t a rogue investigation - they were working with SAU.  Interview SAU people.  Eric Smith former SAU.  Why didn’t you ask if there was a separate investigation.
Q:  Did you ask EP if he stopped cooperating?
A:  No
Q:  Why not?  Did you ask Redick if there was a separate investigation?  I
A:   don’t know.  

Ray Brown's tone was derisive the whole way - implying, and sometimes saying explicitly - that a good investigator would have asked this question or asked for proof or would have done this or that.




I'm thinking this through as I write here.  I want to get something up.  Tomorrow there will be new things to report.  And it's getting late and court starts at 8:30am tomorrow.

 I've gone back to the Brown Report (Part 1, and Part 2) to make a list of all the names.  And as I skim through it this time, after hearing today's testimony, it's making more sense.  That is, I'm more familiar with the names and activities described.

I've concluded that my notes are too sketchy to put up.  I've tried to capture the general nature of the questioning  and how it appeared to me.

I'm still not comfortable with the plaintiff's depiction of Katkus as this great administrator who was on top of issues of sexual abuse and other improprieties in the Guard.  Ray Brown made a big deal of the fact that there was this close relationship between the APD and the Guard  and FBI and the State Troopers when fighting drugs.  And thus there was every reason to share the information with the Guard.  But if Katkus and the Guard were out of control, then sharing the information might have enabled the people in the Guard to clean things up, hide evidence, etc.  And so there were only one or two actual convictions.  If Katkus was wrongly terminated, why haven't we seen his lawsuit?  There are still lots of unanswered questions.

But what's clear is that there was a lot of conflict going on in the APD.  Feuds, vendettas.  The morning session witness was  Jason Whetsell (I think I've got the spelling right but I'm not completely sure.  I used the Brown Report to find a lot of names, but there were still some I wasn't sure about.)  I'm still figuring out where he fit into the bigger picture.  He testified Thursday they said.  (I didn't get to court until Friday.)  They spent all morning on Whetsell, so one would think it's important to the plaintiffs' theory of the case.

Basically Whetsell was an officer who worked with a dog named Alex.  He was in the canine unit, but also worked with the SAU (Special Assignment Unit).  He worked with Anthony Henry over the years and was directly reporting to him for about five months.  But generally he was supervised at the Canine Unit and had a long, poor relationship with a supervisor Sergeant Jason Schmdtt. From what I could figure out, Whetsell felt hounded by Scmidt.  A key factor was that Whetsell was diagnosed with MS and was taking serious drugs that were affecting his performance.  An issue was that allegation that Henry and the other officers in the SAU had tried to protect Whetsell from Schmidt and the various complaints about his erratic behavior.

Some larger issues that came out in the testimony raise serious question about how well the APD was operating then  And of course questions about whether it's any better now.  There were serious divisions.  At one point Chief Mew calls Whetsell into his office to try to work out a deal with him.  He wants him to drop his EEOC complaint (based on discrimination based on his medical condition I'm assuming).  From Whetsell's testimony:

"He wanted me to drop the EEOC complaint.  He said it was causing a fire.  The fire had spread to second floor (admin) and now the whole building is on fire." 

Mew told Whetsell that if he settled the EEOC complaint, then Mew would guarantee that if he laid low and kept his head down, he'd make ti to retirement.  (From what Whetsell said, he made it to a medical retirement, but they wouldn't extend the retirement date a day so his APD health insurance would cover an MRI test.  

Whetsell's record got pretty spotty and it's not clear how much of that was the MS, how much the drugs he was taking for the MS, and how much was the pressure he was feeling from the series of complaints Schmidt was making against him.  There were several incidents that were written up where he had problems performing his job.  Should the APD have made accommodations for him and moved him into a position that allowed him to continue working with his disability?  The did move him to other positions.  One could see that Whetsell, a basketball player and as the MOA attorney characterized him - a good athlete' once - must have been going through hell on several levels.  He was seeing his health deteriorate and he'd been diagnosed with a serious disease.  And with that deterioration, his livelihood was being threatened.  His family live suffered as well.  As portrayed today, Henry and the SAU staff were supporting him and the Canine Unit head was hounding him.  

Other issues came up.  Whetsell was asked about missing lots of work time.  He responded that he took flextime.  The attorney for the Municipality pointed out that the union had given up flextime. Whetsell said that everyone still took it.   I believe that flextime can be very useful as a way of dealing with uneven work loads, allowing people to take time off after a period of heavy workload beyond one's regular duty.  But it has to be carefully monitored and it runs into conflicts with paying people overtime.  What Whetsell seemed to be describing was an unofficial flextime.  But, of course, we don't know whether everyone was doing it.  But it's something to follow up.  

The fire on the second floor was also described as lots of yelling on the second floor - it was hinted that Henry was fighting over how Schmidt was treating Whetsell.  

And Chief Mew's hardball to get Whetsell to drop the EEOC suit was another issue.  Did he not want an outside agency looking to closely at the APD?  What else was he hiding?

And the questioning of Rick Brown raised questions about whether the Brown report was really a custom made report in order to support the position of the MOA legal department?  The impression I got of Rick Brown today was NOT of a competent, independent investigator.  It's a reminder of an old definition of an expert - someone who lives more than 100 miles away.  

And how does all this relate to the discrimination case two police officers won against the Municipality two years ago?  

There's good reason the MOA tried to keep this report hidden.  Today it didn't stand up well to scrutiny.  

I'm afraid this is going to be an active think piece, rather than a well thought out conclusion.  There just isn't time to do more now and I need this up before tomorrow's notes swamp me.


One last thought.  I have great respect for court transcribers.  If you saw my rough notes, you'd know why.

Anthony Henry v MOA - Former Alaska National Guard Boss Katkus Testifies [UPDATED] [2nd UPDATE with Complete Brown Report]

The ADN article Tuesday about the police trial that began Monday had me confused.  The Kyle Hopkins piece Thursday added more confusion.   There was a connection to the police discrimination case of two years ago when two black officers won a  million dollars each for discrimination.  That trial included the judge making extraordinary condemnation of the APD (Anchorage Police Department).

But it also seemed to relate to the Alaska National Guard scandal that helped defeat Gov. Sean Parnell in 2014.  It took him way to long to figure out what was going on and to fire Katkus.

But who exactly was Anthony Henry, why was he fired, and what all was this trial going to reveal to the public about the APD?  The ADN reported that Henry inappropriately shared confidential information about an investigation with the Alaska National Guard.  So, was he part of the web of corruption between the APD and the Guard?  Was he tipping them off?  If so, that would seem good grounds for terminating him.

So I decided that I'd attend the trial to see if I could get a better handle on this.  I missed the first 15 minutes or so.  When I walked in a striking looking man with a shiny bald head sat in the witness chair being questioned about his career and experience.  He was being called General by the attorney. Katkus has had a similar bald pate.  But this guy seemed a much better speaker than I remembered.

Some Background 

I blogged the Alaska legislature in 2010.  At one State Affairs committee meeting I observed the confirmation hearing of Thomas Katkus to be the Adjutant General of the Alaska National Guard.  I sat behind him.  He had a completely bald head and I wasn't impressed by how he handled the session.  Lots of jargon and self importance was my impression.  Looking back at the old post, perhaps this is what turned me off somewhat.  He was talking about quitting the APD to be in the Guard full time (he was already part time), and the note I wrote in the post was "bigger, better toys." I understand that could be a joke, but he clearly meant it.  That's not a good reason in my mind. 

That post got me an email from a spouse of a former Alaska national guardsman who quit because of the corruption in the Guard with Katkus mentioned as part of the problem.

And, like everyone else, I read the newspaper stories about the guard and Sean Parnell's firing of Katkus.  Here's a post on that with lots of the details, including a link to the investigation Parnell used to justify the firing.


Back To The Trial

So it's slowly becoming clear to me that, yes, this is Katkus.  But as the plaintiff's attorney questions him, there's a lot of cognitive dissonance for me.

There were questions and answers about the relationship among the APD, the National Guard, the State Troopers, the FBI.  They all worked together to fight drugs.  It was common for them to share information.  (The argument developing, I assumed, that it was normal for Henry to share the kind of information he was fired for sharing.) There was also discussion about Posse Comitatus - a federal law that limits the army (including the Guard) from being involved in local law enforcement.  Katkus talked about how they have to be careful not to be involved in drug busts, but that they have technical equipment the APD needs and that they have a very close relationship.

Katkus during a break in the trial

The guy being questioned is coming out looking like a victim of a smear campaign by Ken Blaylock, a disgruntled National Guardsman who constantly complained about sex, guns, and drugs abused by the Alaska National Guard.  Katkus, according to this testimony took sexual harassment seriously.  But given the chain of command, those things should have been handled much lower than his level and he shouldn't have heard about it.  (I'd heard about Blaylock in the past too.  He was the guy who had been finally vindicated by all the investigations and the sacking of Katkus.  Now he was being portrayed as a crazy conspiracy theorist.)

When Henry's attorney, Ray Brown, had finished with Katkus, the Guard was now a highly efficient and well run organization.  No one had ever been convicted of any crimes.  Katkus had been a strong leader who'd done nothing wrong.  His firing was based on sensational media reports, not truth.  There were some loose ends - something was fishy with the recruiters, but we never heard resolution about the charges of them having sex parties with high school age recruits.

Are you seeing where my cognitive dissonance is coming from?

When the defense attorney for the Municipality, Doug Parker, questioned Katkus, he pointed out parts of the reports that Ray Brown had skipped over. [Note:  Ray Brown is part of a team of attorneys  representing Anthony Henry.  The Brown Report mentioned in this post was written by a Rick Brown, no relationship.]   Like the survey that found people in the Guard very distrusting of their superiors.  Of severe problems in the department that took sexual harassment complaints from 2007-2011.  The department got a new person who fixed a lot of that, but apparently the distrust continued.  The investigator who looked into Blaylock's charges, apparently didn't look too hard because he found them unbelievable.  And why did Katkus promote Blaylock if he was so problematic?

Katkus' memory got much worse when he was questioned by Parker.

I was also struck by his use - three times I think - of the term "There was no visibility on that"  which, I understood in the context to mean, I never saw that.  Maybe that's their jargon, but it's pretty bizarre sounding to me.

There was also an FBI agent involved in some meetings.  Three times Katkus referred to her as "the lady FBI agent" as though her gender were the most important factor.  We did know her name so he could have said Agent Kirkland without emphasis she wasn't a man. 

Katkus had been an APD officer and knew lots of the APD, but he said there were 4000 people in the Guard and he couldn't keep track of them all.  Yet, at another point he said that in a small organization like the Guard there were lots of rumors.   But as Adjutant General he was many levels above what happened and didn't need to know about details.  Too large for him to know people, so small there was lots of rumors, which, presumably, at the top of the hierarchy, he shouldn't have known about.  Rumors are a symptom of an organization that isn't transparent, where communication is closed. 

Katkus was on the stand from 8:30am until around 2pm.  There were three 15 minute breaks.  Katkus and a juror both needed to catch planes, so they skipped lunch to get out early.

By the end of the day's testimony, my mind was all twisted up.  I think it's important to consider whether what you believe is really true.  Keep an open mind.  This was only my first day at the trial.  I didn't hear the opening arguments or the earlier testimony.  Apparently there is a long, long list of witnesses yet to come.  Including Ken Blaylock.

I went to the Clerk of the Court's office afterward and looked at some of the documents on their computer.  There were several studies mentioned in the trial.  The Brown (Rick Brown) Report that was done for the APD, which had been keep secret until this trial.  The OCI (National Guard Bureau  Office of Complex Investigations)  report that Sean Parnell asked for in 2014.  An Inspector General (IG) report.  There's a report that Lisa Murkowski requested, and various 15-6's which are what some sort of internal Guard reports are called.

I found the Brown Report in the list of documents on the computer in the Clerk's office.  You can't download it or save it to a thumb drive or email it.  So I took pictures of the Cover Page, Reasons for Investigation, Synopsis of Investigation, Time Line of Significant Events, Conclusions, and Recommendations.  Pages 1-21 of 97.  This report was the basis for the two week suspension of then Police Chief Mark Mew and Anthony Brown's termination.  You can see these 21 pages right below.

[UPDATE Oct 21, 2018 10:30pm  - I managed to get an official copy of the Brown Report, so I have deleted my original photos of the computer screen version I posted originally.  It's in two parts.

Brown Report Pt 1 by SteveAK1 on Scribd

Here's Part 2:

Brown Report Part 2 by on Scribd

end of Oct 21, 2018 10:30pm  UPDATE0


When I got home home I checked the old post I did when Katkus was fired.  It should help people unfamiliar with all this understand why today was like being Alice in Wonderland.  But at the recommendation of a reader, I copied the OCI report and posted it at Scribd where you can still see it.

It almost felt like this was a trial to exonerate Katkus and to find Blaylock guilty.  This is supposed to be a couple week long trial.  Don't hold your breath.

[UPDATE Oct 21, 2018:  Devin Kelly's article in today's ADN does a much better job of conveying the details of the Friday trial.  I was having a lot of trouble figuring out what all the details were leading to, so I just gave some broad background.  Devin gives more details.  Also I've corrected the spelling of Blaylock.  It has a y.]

Cleansing Of The Pole, Then Changing Of Command To Adjuntant General Hummel

This is the 'honor pole' in front of the Alaska National Guard Headquarters.  Today, prior to the Changing of the Command ceremony from Acting Adjutant General Mike Bridges to Adjutant General Laurel Hummel, was a ceremony to cleanse the pole that had been dedicated a few years ago.  Tlingets and local Athabaskans from Eklutna joined together to cleanse the pole after the scandal the National Guard has gone through.

A member of the St. Elias Dance Group.

Lt. Governor Mallot at the cleansing ceremony.  I'm not using the word totem because there are some questions about combining the old and new traditions and the recognition that this pole doesn't necessarily meet the standards of a traditional totem pole.  So the decided to call it an honor pole instead. 

New Adjutant General Hummel dancing after the cleansing ceremony.

The crowd then moved inside and the Hearts of Oceana Club - West High students mentored by the Polynesian Community Center - danced before the Change of Command.

Gov. Walker was there as well.

Adjutant General Hummel in her speech which ranged from personal to inspirational.. She talked about how her army dad answered her six year old self about her desire to follow him into the army, that  while West Point didn't take women at the time, they would when she was ready to apply.

She talked about how when the governor-elect asked her to be the Adjutant General, she was taken aback.  She said she hadn't applied because her husband worked at the guard, so she would have a conflict of interest.  But the governor and her husband insisted.  And in a few days, her husband heads for a year in Kosovo where he'll be head of intelligence for NATO there.  She then turned to the members of the Alaska National Guard - how honored she is to work with them, how much she values and trusts them, and how together they will make the Guard a better organization.

This is an interesting confluence of two stories I've followed here.  One began when I covered Laurel Hummel's interview to be director of the Alaska Redistricting Board.   The other is the story of the Alaska National Guard scandal.  The links each go to one post.  There were a number of posts on each and you can get to the others by clicking on the appropriate labels.  This was a positive event, I'm sure the governor would like to spend more of his time doing this sort of thing.

Hummel Story Makes LA Times Leads Me To Thoughts About Online News Issues

The headline, "Alaska - Woman named to lead Guard," probably explains the interest.  It follows up with discussion of the sexual abuse scandal.  (I wrote about Hummel's appointment yesterday.)

The article itself exemplifies one of the issues I've been having over online news (including ethics of updating blog posts).  In this case, the online stories and the print stories don't match.
Here's the link to the online LA Times Story.

The first two paragraphs are the same, but the print story capitalizes Department of Veterans and Military Affairs while the online version doesn't.  Maybe I noticed that because capitalization is one of my problems here.

The two seem to be the same until the end of the paragraph that starts "In September . . ." and ends " . . .confidentiality had been breached."

The online version adds that she was a professor at West Point and doesn't mention that she's a Democrat.  Neither mentioned her PhD in geography.

The print version ends abruptly:

"Hummel graduated from West Point in 1982 and served 30 years of active duty.
A Democrat, Hummel ran unsuccessfully for a seat in the state House of Representatives in November."

I find the last sentence interesting because I suspect that a lot of folks will say, "Another unsuccessful politician gets a helped by the party into a cushy job."  But that would be a very wrong conclusion.  First, party stuff is all mixed up in Alaska now that we have an 'independent' former Republican governor teamed up with a Democratic Lt. governor.  But much more than that.

This is a story I know better than most stories.  I met Hummel right after the 80% Republican Redistricting Board rejected her and two other candidates for their Executive Director position - a non-partisan position for which she was exceedingly well qualified.   I talked to Hummel shortly after that - I was so impressed by how she handled herself that I contacted her because I just wanted to meet this well qualified and well-spoken woman.  We kept in contact while she was recruited by the Democrats to run for the state house in her district.  She laughed at them at first, but as she met some of the other Democratic legislators in Anchorage who came to persuade her, she was impressed with them.  They appealed to her sense of duty and public service and she finally agreed. (Really, I know this sounds like a pr piece, but that's really what happened.)   She'd never been involved in a political campaign and was particularly displeased about the having to ask people for money.  But she put herself totally into it and lost to an incumbent by 2l3 votes, less than 1% of the vote.

Is this a cushy job for Hummel?  It's one she's excited about and also a little anxious about.  She's never been in the National Guard and there's a lot of stuff to do.  She also doesn't believe the Adjutant General should be head of the National Guard AND the state head of veteran and military affairs. Because it's a military job, she has to forego her military pension and disability* payment.  Even more problematic is that her husband, who works in the Army National Guard in Alaska, has to resign his position.  But, she told me, he insisted this was an opportunity she couldn't pass up.

But let's get on to other questions, questions I ask myself as I blog, both as a blogger and as a user of online news.  Some differences between online and print and how I feel about them:

1. An online piece can be longer than a print piece so you can include more than you would print.  Print stories should say if there is more online, and some do.   It would be nice if the online story content that was in addition to or different from the print story, were a different color or otherwise marked.  I suspect most print media don't keep such close track of those things and would claim it would be a big burden.
2. You can update an online piece.  You can only print a later correction in print.  I think it makes sense to update and correct only stories, but those changes that are substantive should be marked.  I do that here.  Otherwise, unless someone saves each version or finds a different version cached, there's no way to know whether a story you read - say three months later - is the same story that was there in the beginning.  This has all sorts of Orwellian possibilities.
3. Typos that have no consequence to the meaning should be fixed when spotted and don't need to be marked.  Minor word changes that clarify but don't change the meaning also don't need to be marked, but this hangs on people's interpretation of 'minor' and 'change the meaning.'

I decide it would be prudent to check what professional journalists have to say on this.  There was an article in the April 2014  American Journalism Review about a draft Code of Ethics from the Society for Professional Journalist coming out in September 2014:

The code draft acknowledges a different environment for news by advising journalists to “Aggressively gather and update information as a story unfolds and work to avoid error. Deliberate distortion and reporting unconfirmed rumors are never permissible.”

Well, that agrees with me about updating, but doesn't mention identifying the updates.  Should the story be dated as of the latest update or the original story?  This will matter later when people look back to see when something was known.  And in the competition between news companies, who gets the credit for being the first to report?  

I'd note that I tried to contact Soumya Karlamangla, the reporter on the LA Times Hummel piece.  I originally wanted to ask her questions about the differences between the online and print versions and who makes those decisions.  As I looked at other stories she's written, I was wondering how she got this story.  There was an AP story and and ADN story.  It's unlikely she was writing this as an original piece.  But there is no source identified and it's not labeled an AP story.  What is it that she did to what she found online that changes it from a wire story to one that deserves her own byline?  (I couldn't find an email address for her but I did tweet her.  But didn't hear anything back.  I'm not clear about whether a tweet to her is public or not.  When I saw it in my list of tweets much later, I took it down.  There are too many protocols on too many systems for me to keep up.  OK, I looked it up, only folks who subscribe to both me and Karlamangla would get it in their timelines.  There's a table online that tells you who can see different kinds of tweets.  Here's the relevant information from that table to my question.  It would be publicly visible on my timeline.

click to enlarge and focus

Back to the American Journalism Review article mentioned above that talked about updating online articles.  I went to the Society of Professional Journalists website to see what their revised code looked like and if it had that language.  I couldn't find any language that specifically addressed updating online articles.  Here are the four main principles.  Each then has a list of standards of practice under it.  You can get the Code as a pdf here.

• SEEK TRUTH AND REPORT INGJournalists should be honest, fair and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting information.Journalists should: 
• MINIMIZE HARMEthical journalists treat sources, subjects and colleagues as human beings deserving of respect.Journalists should:
• 􏰀 ACT INDEPENDENTLYJournalists should be free of obligation to any interest other than the public’s right to know.Journalists should:
• 􏰀BE ACCOUNTABLEJournalists are accountable to their readers, listeners, viewers and each other. Journalists should:  

Doesn't really address my questions.  

*I asked Hummel during the campaign about what her disability entailed.  On the one hand, it's none of my business, but I suspected that some voters would wonder how she could hold the job of legislator if she was disabled.  Her response was that it was not a payment because you were so disabled you couldn't work, but rather compensation for injuries caused by your service in the military.    She was at West Point ages 18-22 and then in the military until she was 51.  She said hers were mainly orthopedic; "running too many miles with a heavy rucksack and jumping out of too many airplanes."  There is a very specific protocol for doctors to determine the injury and the percent of disability for each injury.  You can see how they calculate it precisely here.

West Point Grad Laurie Hummel To Be New Alaska National Guard Adjutant General

The ADN has a good report on this up already so I'll try to add what I know about Laurie Hummel.

I first 'met' Laurie Hummel when she was interviewed by the Alaska Redistricting Board to be their executive director.  I was so incredibly impressed by how perfectly her background qualified her for the job AND by how well she presented herself and her knowledge.  She was both assertive and respectful.  In that interview she was asked to describe her managerial experience as it related to the job.  It was all impressive and you can see my very rough transcript here.

A part that particularly warmed my blogger heart was when she spoke about confidentiality and public information.  She said you have to set up categories:

"what you have to share, should share, can’t.  Things that have to be shared with the public [you share]  and that’s how it should be.  I come from climate that values ethics.  I hold the highest ethical standards. I see a big difference where there’s an enemy.  Here I see no enemies.  Press and people are not enemies."

I was blown away by Hummel that day and wrote one of the most enthusiastic posts I've ever written about anybody on this blog.

Second Applicant Incredible: Laurel Hummel, Vet and Geographer

When the Board decided not to fill the position, I was seriously disappointed and wrote a two part post exploring possible reasons why.

• How Could Redistricting Board NOT Hire Laurel Hummel? Political Neutrality Appears Ripped To Shreds - Part 1
• How Could Redistricting Board NOT Hire Laurel Hummel? Political Neutrality Appears Ripped To Shreds - Part 2

The last post I did that focused on Laurie Hummel was about her announcement to run for State House.  

Laurie Hummel Announces Bid for State House Seat - Laurie Who?

I was (and still am) so impressed with Hummel that I decided I had to help her win.  People complain about the lack of good politicians all the time.  But there won't be any unless the rest of us work hard to elect those who are willing to run.  It was time for me to get directly involved.

After I became involved in her campaign  I felt I could no longer report on the race.  Sure, I could have declared my involvement and written, but I didn't want this blog to be a billboard for one candidate.

Hummel ran a great campaign and came very close to beating an incumbent in her first race.  
Today I learned of her appointment to be Adjutant General of the Alaska National Guard by Governor Walker.

I called Hummel today to congratulate her.  She told me she hadn't expected this.  Her husband, Chad Parker, is a colonel in the national guard and when the governor asked her to take the position, she decided she'd ask to be deputy.  That's a civilian, state position, that wouldn't put her directly over her husband.  But Chad told her she couldn't turn this opportunity down.  Accepting the position requires her husband's resignation from the Guard.

In October, during the campaign, she'd written an op-ed piece in the ADN on how to reform the national guard. (I'm assuming my readers know about the scandal which played a role in defeating our former governor's reelection bid.)  She listed six steps to heal the Guard, which I'm abbreviating here.  You can read the whole piece here.

1. Immediately hold legislative hearings -- with witnesses under oath -- to independently investigate malfeasance in the Guard.
2. Appoint an independent special prosecutor to address criminal actions not currently enforceable by the Guard’s antiquated, ineffective state version of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
3. The Legislature must create a viable UCMJ. The Guard must advise and guide but the state’s Military Code is a state statute. This is the province of our Legislature. The heavy lifting for creating a meaningful and effective code is done in committee. This would appropriately be accomplished by the House Committee on Military and Veterans Affairs. But again, nothing is happening on that front.
4. Separate the adjutant general (TAG) position from the commissioner, DMVA position. Tom Katkus and his predecessors were dual-hatted as the TAG and commissioner.
5. Fill the existing military legislative liaison position to the Alaska Legislature.
6.  The commander-in-chief (our governor) must demand, receive and embrace unfettered access to Guard issues and take a personal and active part in restoring a culture of transparency. 

She was hoping to work on these as a legislator and these focus on what the legislature and governor need to do.  But now she gets to work on these from the inside and from the top.

Side note:  Hummel will become the first female adjutant general of the Alaska National Guard.  She told me there had been women heads in Vermont and Ohio, but they have left office.  Other states are appointing their heads now as well and she wasn't sure if there would be another woman among them.

As I explore google's offerings on "women adjutant generals national guard" I get
Ohio's Maj. Gen. Deborah Ashenhurst and Vermont's Major General, Martha T. Rainville and Alaska's Col Laurel Hummel in the first five hits.  Moving down the lists there are a number of male adjutant generals whose page mentions "the fine men and women."  


But then up popped up BG Mary Kight who became California's first female, African-American adjutant general in 2010.  Are there others?  If Hummel pops up already, I'm guessing that if there were other women appointed to be their states' adjutant generals recently, they would show up.  But proving there are no black swans is harder than proving there is one.

An Explanation for Nancy Dahlstrom's Harsh Response To National Guard Complaints

Let's connect some dots.

Among the many emails released by Gov. Parnell over the weekend in response to a court order was this one from Rep. Nancy Dahlstrom quoted in part in the Alaska Dispatch News Monday:

“Your statements are reckless and have the potential to cause irreparable damage to these fine officers,” Dahlstrom said in an email dated Aug. 25, 2009, to Debra Blaylock, a just-retired lieutenant colonel in the guard. “I take great offense to your statement that it is a ‘good old boy’ network with corrupt leadership. I believe the current leaders are outstanding and have made tremendous advancements in improving the overall morale, day-to-day operations, direction, and relevancy of the organization. I have never seen it function better. As a citizen of Alaska, I am truly proud to call them my National Guard.”

 Laura Pierre and Rules Chair Nancy Dahlstrom (Image Source)

Dahlstrom concluded her email with even stronger language: “There is no room for mean spirited, unsubstantiated, and malicious correspondence targeted towards the undermining and destruction of the excellent reputation and character of Alaska’s leadership.”

This is pretty harsh.  Not the kind of letter that legislators usually write to the public, even if they aren't their constituents. 

I have a strong suspicion why this email supported the Guard so strongly and so meanly chastised Debra Blaylock:  Laura Pierre.

 
Who is Laura Pierre?


Laura Pierre is the wife of McHugh Pierre.

McHugh Pierre was,  until his recent forced resignation, Civilian Deputy Commissioner for the Alaska Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.  This is the state department that includes:

• US Property and Facilities Office,  
• Alaska Aerospace Commission 
• Army National Guard 
• Air National Guard 
• Homeland Security and Emergency Management
• Alaska Youth Academy
• Veterans Affairs
• Alaska State Defense Force
• Alaska Naval Militia, 
• Office of Facilities Management.

The ADN, in a long article on McHugh Pierre's forced resignation wrote that investigators found

"Pierre had also inserted himself into the efforts of whistle-blowers who were working to alert Parnell to serious concerns about how sexual assault cases were being managed. "

Source

While McHugh was working in the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, his wife Laura Pierre was on Nancy Dahlstrom's legislative staff.





Some Background

When I went down to Juneau to be a volunteer staffer for Max Gruenberg in 2010, the Rules Committee was telling Max Gruenberg that he could not have a full time volunteer staffer.  I didn't know this until the afternoon of the day of new staff training.  At the end of that session - there's a description of the panel with a photo at the bottom of this 2010 post -  I asked one of the panelists a question.  She asked me which office I was going to be a staffer in.  I answered I would be a volunteer for Rep. Gruenberg.  At that point Laura Pierre jumped into the discussion and, in a very forceful voice, said something like, "There will be no volunteer staffers."  I was taken aback not only by the message, but even more by the vehemence of her tone. And it was the first time that I realized that my volunteer position was in jeopardy.

I had introduced myself to Nancy Dahlstrom during the break that morning and she had been very polite and cordial.  Rep. Dahlstrom also treated me warmly when the final decision came down that Rep. Gruenberg could not have a full time volunteer staffer.  She welcomed my proposal that I would stay in Juneau as a blogger and told me that if I needed anything to let her know.   Later we did have a long, very friendly, and interesting discussion in her office.

Finally, Connecting The Dots

All this background causes me to suspect that Dahlstrom's view of the Guard and  Lt. Blaylock was strongly influenced by her staffer, Laura Pierre, who was in turn influenced by her husband who the investigators said, as quoted above, "inserted himself into the efforts of whistle-blowers who were working to alert Parnell to serious concerns about how sexual assault cases were being managed."  And since staffers often draft communications for their legislator bosses,  I wouldn't be surprised if Pierre drafted the email in question.

If that is the case, then Dahlstrom's response and apology reflects well on her professionalism and leadership.  She took full responsibility for the email without a hint that someone else might have written it.  And, of course, as the boss whose name was on the email, that's how she should respond.  But there are other legislators who would have shifted the blame to a staffer, even if the staffer hadn't written it.