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HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Preliminary results of an investigation into inappropriate emails found on state servers will be released Tuesday, Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane announced.
Kane in December ordered the review by former Maryland Attorney General Douglas Gansler of offensive, sometimes raunchy and sometimes pornographic material shared among judges, prosecutors and others in the criminal justice system.
Gansler has said that it is unlikely that the probe would result in criminal charges but indicated that he intends to make all of the material public. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported earlier this month that he said many of the nearly six million messages he and his team had reviewed were "offensive and inappropriate for government employees to be sending to each other . . . but most of it is protected speech."
Gansler said his report will identify judges and judicial employees by name as well as any employees inside the Attorney General's Office who forwarded the messages to others. But employees who merely received the emails will not be identified because "there is a clear distinction between those who received emails and ignored them . . . and those who took them and sent them on," he said.
The email scandal has led to resignations, firings or disciplinary action as well as retirement of two state Supreme Court justices and ethics charges against one of them.
Kane, who is not running for re-election, faces an August trial on charges that she leaked secret grand jury material, allegations she hotly denies.
In announcing the probe, she said the emails' content showed a lack of tolerance or respect for others, as well as state and federal constitutional violations.
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