Free Republic

See previous Trooper'gate posts hereIt's been a slow whirlwind of activity on the dual (and dueling) investigations of Sarah Palin, known as Trooper'gate. So I'll catch you up on both the legislation investigation (aka, the "witchhunt") and the Personnel Board investigation (aka the authority via Alaskan State law to hear complaints under the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act.) The brief version so many like to have? (which I never recommend, since you should read and form your own opinions...) The legislative investigation has piled on yet one more event in their process that has the AG eyeing them and their...

The former Alaska public safety commissioner who refused to fire a state trooper embroiled in a domestic dispute with Gov. Sarah Palin's sister says he holds no grudge, but still believes the GOP vice presidential nominee is too thin-skinned for the job she hopes to fill. -snip- It turns out that well before he was jettisoned for what he says was his refusal to fire trooper Wooten at the behest of Sarah Palin, Monegan had his own share of domestic troubles - some of them spilling all the way down to the Bay Area. In October 1994, Monegan's estranged wife,...

I have run across some very explosive audio from an Alaska Joint Judicial Committee Hearing. What you will hear is the committee discussing who's really running the investigation. One of the committee members tells the "independent" investigator Branchflower that he has the right to put someone on the subpoena list who was omitted for some reason. However, investigator Branchflower refuses to do so, saying that he must consult with Mr. French, the Alaskan Democratic Senator leading the "troopergate" investigation. This confuses the committee member, who wonders why he has to consult with Hollis French at all. Does that mean Hollis...

The judge warned her and her relatives not to disparage Wooten in front of the kids. "Disparaging is not to be tolerated — it's a form of child abuse," Suddock said... Wooten, 36, admits using a Taser on his stepson...

Excerpt - ANCHORAGE, ALASKA -The abuse of power investigation against Sarah Palin, Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential candidate, took a potentially ominous turn for her party on Friday when state lawmakers voted to subpoena her husband. ~ snip ~

Alaska state legislators were asked to approve subpoenas for the husband of GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and 12 others, as part of an ongoing investigation into whether Palin abused her power as state governor. palin french Troopergate investigator Sen. Hollis French seeks subpoenas for 13 witnesses and the phone records of Sarah Palin aide. In a nondescript conference room filled to capacity, special counsel Steven Branchflower asked lawmakers to issue subpoenas to Alaska "First Dude" Todd Palin and a dozen current and former state officials, including aides to Gov. Palin, to determine whether she had overstepped her authority...

"Thanks to John McCain’s selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate, many people across the country are for the first time learning about how her state’s law authorizing union “exclusive” bargaining over public-safety and other government employees works in practice."

For background on this ever updating story, see Trooper'Gate: beating the MSM to the truth" and Left falsely accuses Palin of "refusing to testify" As the Obama supporters blanket the Internet with bits and pieces of suggested scandal to combat America's enthusiams for Sarah Palin, the fuel is Trooper'gate for the most misinformation and, more importantly, mischaracterizations. The accusers were off and running on a legislative investigation with endlessly morphing charges in the media, and an undetermined, unnamed group of suspects. They had witness interviews scheduled, and a planned date for the release of their findings... Oct 31, ... four...

Trooper Wooten is the Trooper in Troopergate. In addition to tasering his own 11 year old stepson, he THREATENED TO KILL Sarah Palins Father. "I was young. I made mistakes, I paid a price, the mistakes are behind me." No ill will to family-excited about bid for VP- Not happy his private life being exposed Agreed to interview only under condition union official present. 36 years old, married and divorced 4 times.

EAGLE RIVER, Alaska, Sept. 3 -- Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the running mate for GOP presidential candidate John McCain, wrote e-mails that harshly criticized Alaska state troopers for failing to fire her former brother-in-law and ridiculed an internal affairs investigation into his conduct. The e-mails were shown to The Washington Post by a former public safety commissioner, Walter Monegan, who was fired by Palin in July. Monegan has given copies of the e-mails to state ethics investigators to support his contention that he was dismissed for failing to fire Trooper Mike Wooten, who at the time was feuding with Palin's...

Politics: You'll be hearing a lot in coming weeks about Sarah Palin's "abuse of power" in trying to get a state cop fired. Here's the back story you won't be hearing.Palin's political enemies have a stink bomb set to go off late in October, just before the election. That's when voters will see fruits of a legislative investigation into the charge that the governor fired Alaska's Public Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan because he wouldn't get rid of Mike Wooten, a state trooper and Palin's ex-brother-in-law. We can see where this is headed. Palin will be found to have done nothing...

Gov. Sarah Palin wants a state board to review the circumstances surrounding the dismissal of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan -- taking the unusual step of making an ethics complaint against herself. Her lawyer sent an "ethics disclosure" Monday night to Attorney General Talis Colberg. The governor asked that it go to the three-person Personnel Board as a complaint. While ethics complaints are usually confidential, Palin wants the matter open. The lawyer, Thomas Van Flein, also asked the state Legislature to drop its own investigation into the Monegan matter. He says the Personnel Board has jurisdiction over ethics. A senator...

Excerpt - ~ snip ~ But Gov. Palin, in papers filed with the request for investigation, said she never knew the trooper had been disciplined until after she removed the commissioner over what she called a dispute over budget and other issues and his personnel files were made public. In the papers, she said the trooper since 2005 has continued to behave aggressively toward her family, taunting them "that he was a trooper and nothing would bring him down." For example, Gov. Palin alleged the trooper confronted her daughter Bristol at a football game, calling her an obscenity. ~ snip...

Former Department of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan on Friday said that since Gov. Sarah Palin took office, members of her administration and family pressured him to fire a Palmer Alaska State Trooper to whom her sister was involved in a bitter child custody battle. Monegan said phone calls and questions from the Palin administration and the governor's husband, Todd Palin, about trooper Mike Wooten started shortly after Monegan was hired and continued up to one or two months ago. The governor herself also had a brief conversation with him about Wooten in February, Monegan said. The new assertions from...

He's the governor's ex-brother-in-law, and his job as an Alaska State Trooper is drawing scrutiny in a way rarely seen except in cases of killings by officers. ----snip---- He's a father of young children who has been married and divorced four times. ----snip---- "The record clearly indicates a serious and concentrated pattern of unacceptable and at times, illegal activity occurring over a lengthy period, which establishes a course of conduct totally at odds with the ethics of our profession," Col. Julia Grimes, then head of Alaska State Troopers, wrote in March 1, 2006, letter suspending Wooten for 10 days. After...