Albany Riveted by Bruno Surveillance Allegations

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...rgate-spygate/

(Gold9472: Eliot Spitzer was the Attorney General of New York that refused to acknowledge the call for a new investigation into 9/11, and also refused to allow Dietrich Snell to testify before the Able Danger hearings held by Rep. Weldon.)

By Danny Hakim
7/5/2007

Joseph L. Bruno, the State Senate majority leader, is now in full attack mode with Gov. Eliot Spitzer over suggestions that the senator improperly used state helicopters and state police escorts.

This morning, Mr. Bruno called on the state inspector general to investigate “the governor’s abuse of the powers of the State Police” by having them keep logs of his activities when they drove him around, as The New York Post reported this morning. Mr. Bruno also called for the attorney general and the Albany County district attorney to “convene grand juries to assess criminal liability of the governor for his abuse of power.”

For good measure, he called the governor’s aides “hoodlums” and “thugs.” He said he would only meet with the governor publicly to avoid having his comments mischaracterized. And he said the governor’s “dangerous abuse of power is despicable, possibly illegal and undermines our democratic form of government.”

The Spitzer administration fired back, saying that there had been nothing like surveillance of Mr. Bruno, saying the State Police was just following standard procedure. It also blasted the Post article — which said that similar logs were not kept for the governor — and called it “grossly inaccurate.”

But the governor’s administration did agree to have the inspector general, a Spitzer appointee, investigate.

Darren Dopp, Mr. Spitzer’s communications director, said the State Police kept “no special records” beyond “a simple accounting of a state police vehicle’s use.”

But it is not clear that this “simple accounting” was done for the governor or other state officials. And it consists of details of each stop that a trooper made while driving the senator. At 7 p.m. on May 3, for example, state police records turned over by the Spitzer administration show that Senator Bruno stopped for dinner “at Italian restaurant on East Side (unknown name, located between First Avenue and Second Avenue in the upper 40s.)” At 11 p.m., he was “transported back to Sheraton Hotel.”

The Spitzer administration has been asked for similar State Police documentation of the governor’s itinerary, but has not provided them.

Here is the text of Mr. Bruno’s statement:
I was stunned to learn that Governor Spitzer is using the fine men and women of the New York State Police to conduct surveillance on me. This type of dangerous abuse of power is despicable, possibly illegal and undermines our democratic form of government.

I am calling on the state inspector general to investigate the Governor’s abuse of the powers of the State Police. I am also requesting the attorney general and Albany County district attorney to convene grand juries to assess the criminal liability of the governor for his abuse of the power of his office and the misuse of the State Police for political espionage.

I am also calling on the acting superintendent of the State Police to immediately commence an internal investigation regarding these reports.

The heart of why people have elected government is to ensure that citizens are protected from this type of abuse. When the governor abuses his power, it not only works against his political enemies, it undermines the entire fabric of democracy.

The governor’s pattern of behavior over the years, his repeated physical threats to state officials and others, his complete and total disregard for the State Legislature, his desire to run state government as a dictatorship, his continued disregard for the truth and now his willingness to use the State Police for surveillance in hopes of gaining some type of political advantage should send shivers up the spine of every New Yorker and raise serious questions about his fitness to serve in the state’s highest office.

According to news reports, the governor ordered the State Police to keep records of my travels in New York City, records that are not kept for other state officials, including the governor and the lieutenant governor. The governor then conspired with The Albany Times Union to concoct inaccurate stories and baseless charges about my trips to New York that media reports have proven were for legislative business.

My counsel has contacted both the state attorney general’s office and the Albany County district attorney’s office and I am voluntarily supplying information to substantiate that the trips in question were for legislative business.

Who’s next, what’s next?

It is time Governor Spitzer understood that the people of this state elected him to lead and to govern, not to spy, threaten and conduct political attacks.
Here is the text of Mr. Dopp’s statement on behalf of the Spitzer administration:
A story suggesting that the State Police were asked to do anything other than follow standard operating procedure is grossly inaccurate and false.
There has never been any surveillance of Majority Leader Bruno by the State Police.

When they have been asked to drive the majority leader, the State Police work from schedules supplied by the majority leader’s office. No special records are kept beyond a simple accounting of a state police vehicle’s use.

A similar procedure is followed when the State Police are driving the governor and others.

We are confident that proper procedures were followed at all times. However, since a concern has been raised, we are asking the state inspector general to review the matter.