Making an investigation difficult

The Texas Department of Public Safety has decided to make any investigation into the search for the Democrat house members who disappeared for a while last week harder by destroying all records created by or involved in the search.

A one-sentence order sent by e-mail on the morning of May 14 was apparently carried out, a DPS spokesman said Tuesday. The revelation comes as federal authorities are investigating how a division of the federal Homeland Security Department was dragged into the hunt for the missing Democrats - at the request of the state police agency.

Addressed to "Captains," the order said: "Any notes, correspondence, photos, etc. that were obtained pursuant to the absconded House of Representative members shall be destroyed immediately. No copies are to be kept. Any questions please contact me."

It was signed by the commander of the DPS Special Crimes Service, L.C. "Tony" Marshall.

At the moment, it's unclear if the destruction of these records is a crime or not, but either way, it certainly lends credence to the idea that one or more aspects of the search needed to be investigated.

House Speaker Tom Craddick, a Republican, recently said the investigating committee could look at the issue if it wanted to. It was Craddick who originally ordered the DPS to find the Democrats and return them to the state Capitol so that the House could achieve the quorum necessary to bring up a congressional redistricting bill. The boycott successfully killed that bill and others.

DPS spokesman Tom Vinger could not say Tuesday who, if anyone, gave Marshall the order to destroy records, but he said there was nothing inappropriate about it.

One aspect of the search that has been a target for an investigation is the involvement, at the request of a DPS officer, of the Homeland Security Department's Air and Marine Interdiction Coordination Center. Typically, the Interdiction center investigates drug planes and planes that may be related to terrorist activities. The call they received from the DPS, however, indicated that they were concerned that a representative's plane may have gone down. The Interdiction Center made calls into the situation, but got no information.

Even before the destruction was ordered, it was clear that there would be at least some kind of investigation into the DPS search for the Democrats. There's no way the DPS could not have known that. Their deliberate destruction of the documents in such a hurried fashion indicates that they must have known there would be something for an investigation to find. Given the climate of official secrecy that the Bush administration has created and perpetuates, it's not at all surprising that the DPS would decide it's ok to go ahead and destroy all the documents related to this search.

Posted by thorswitch at May 21, 2003 04:22 PM | TrackBack