Kathleen Kane’s Office Cancels Porngate News Conference

A news conference scheduled for today at which Attorney General Kathleen Kane was expected to release preliminary findings of an investigation into the Porngate scandal has been cancelled.

Solicitor General Bruce Castor Jr. made the decision, which he announced via email yesterday. Castor said that the working draft of the report compiled by special prosecutor Douglas Gansler “was not comprehensive, and that too many of the emails provided in support of the working draft report were redacted.”

The best part: “I don’t care about the outcome of the report,” Castor told the Inquirer. “I just want it to be thorough and complete. I didn’t want little pieces of the pie, and that’s what I got: I got a porno slice.”

We repeat: A porno slice.

Kane hired Castor, the former Montgomery County District Attorney, as her top aide in March. Castor vowed to have the investigation wrapped up by Memorial Day.

Gansler, the former Maryland Attorney General who Kane appointed as special prosecutor for the “Porngate” case in December, has led the probe into the pornographic, misogynistic and racist emails sent and received on state computers. Gansler was expected to review more than 1 million email exchanges and determine whether any crimes had been committed.

Gansler told the Inquirer in April that he did not expect to call for anyone’s arrest because, though some government employees have violated workplace rules by exchanging porn, they may not have violated criminal statutes.

Castor’s hesitation to release the report raises questions about whether it will be truly independent, as Kane has promised. For his part, Castor dismissed that he was delaying the release of Gansler’s findings in effort to shape them, and both Gansler and Castor have stressed that their work is independent and that they are acting without consultation with Kane.

Another presentation will be scheduled over the summer, according to the Attorney General’s offoce.

The Porngate scandal has so far resulted in several resignations and early retirements as well as disciplinary action against at least 61 employees in the Attorney General’s office.

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