Kristine Hamann

Here is a clip from the hearing in Albany yesterday where state Senator George Winner asks state Inspector General Kristine Hamann about a private conversation in which Hamann told him she never interviewed anyone in the governor's office during her investigation into the Trooper scandal.

It's significant because Hamann had the power to subponea gubernatorial aides to testify about who ordered the state police to create records of state Senate Major Leader Joe Bruno's use of state aircraft. Those aides declined to speak to investigators working for the Attorney General, whose office does not have subpoena power.

Hamann later said her report would have been futile becaues it would not have brought finality to the situation.

State Inspector General Kristine Hamann said today for the first time in public that her report on the governor’s aides using state police to track the governor’s Republican opponent would not have brought “finality” to the issue.

Therefore, Hamann told a hearing committee in Albany, she didn’t issue a report on her investigation, nor subpoena any of the top aides to the governor involved.  Hamann has been criticized for not issuing her own report or subpoenaing the governor’s aides to discuss the issue, something another investigator, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, was not empowered to do when he released his report on the matter.

Hamann, surrounded by a throng of reporters in the Capitol, was asked why she didn't seek to speak to the aides in question.

“For the very reason I’ve explained at this hearing, [which] is that I felt I could not bring finality to the matter.”

And what does “finality” mean in this instance?

“No matter what I would have said, there still would have been questions raised and the issue still would have gone to the ethics commission and the Albany county DA and I believe we would be in the same issue were are in today.”

And so the saga continues...

State Inspector General Kristine Hamann chats with Democratic state Senator Eric Schneiderman before she testifies in Albany to the Republican led Investigations Committee about her inquiry of Eliot Spitzer and Troopergate.

Here’s what state Inspector General Kristine Hamann just said about the notion of a conflict of interest in her investigation into Spitzer aide Rich Baum, who she reports to:

"You might want to know the federal inspector general, Glenn Fine, who reports to Alberto Gonzales, is investigating Alberto Gonzales."

She later said any investigation into Baum "would not have brought final resolution" to the issue, since the Albany district attorney was still reviewing the issue for criminal wrongdoing.

So, to no one’s surprise, the Senate Republicans are starting to turn the screws on state Inspector General Kristine Hamann at her hearing in Albany.

Hamann told the committee just now, "I did not believe that my writing a report on the man I report to directly in this atmosphere would have brought resolution to this issue."

When pressed by Republican Senator George Winner, Hamann said she wouldn't disclose the name of the person she spoke to in the governor's office in connection to her inquiry.

Winner implied that Hamann had not questioned anyone in the governor's office.  read more »

A snippet of state Inspector General Kristine Hamann's early testimony before the state Senate Investigations Committee in Albany:

"Though I am a part of the organization I am investigating, a number of safeguards ensure my independence," she said, reading from prepared remarks.

Among those safeguards, she said, is the fact that she is "not subject to the removal by the governor at will."

A law professor testifying in an Albany hearing said of the inspector general who investigated the Spitzer administration that "perhaps she should have referred it" to the attorney general.

The professor, Michael Hutter of Albany Law, later opted not to get more specific than that about the actions of Inspector General Kristine Hamann, saying, "I honestly just don't have any position on that."  read more »

The state Senate Investigations Committee just announced they’ll have their second public hearing on Thursday, September 6 in Albany.

And scheduled to appear there is the Inspector General herself, Kristine Hamann, who has come under fire for not producing a report of her investigation into Eliot Spitzer’s office, nor announcing she had a conflict of interest when the person she reports to, Rich Baum, became a subject of her inquiry.

The first hearing was a quite a show, with Republicans grilling witnesses and Democrats denouncing the entire proceeding as a partisan show-trial.

I called Hamann’s office just now to confirm her attendance.

In her only interview about the subject, Hamann defending herself to the New York Times [archived] by saying that there’s always a conflict of interest.

''In almost every case, you can argue a conflict,'' she said of her job. ''An inspector general's office is within the organization, so normal analyses of conflict can't really apply here because you are necessarily within the organization. But if you say that an organization doesn't have the right to police itself, how can an organization really try and move forward?''

Does anyone know of any useful precedent from how other states have handled this sort of thing?