SECOND UPDATE
On September 8, at 8a I called 202 514 3435, Glenn Fine’s number, and
explained what happened and the secretary there told me to call 202 616 4760 to
get another fax number. That’s the
number for Investigations, which may mean that the internal affairs issues are
not being handled because internal affairs issues are not accessible records
for any department but rather for those in management who handle such
issues. Investigations would not have
such information and would not be getting or handling such complaints. And so this could very well mean that there
will be no legitimate or official investigation because if they don’t address
their internal affairs issues there won’t be a new determination. And if there’s no determination for OIG jurisdiction
and an extension of the statute of limitations, then there won’t be an
investigation, and so on. But I didn’t
take it up then and there because I wanted to see what doing as she instructed
yielded first.
So I called 202 616 4760 as instructed, and they were not answering
their phones yet, even though it was after 8a by then. I left a message but did not receive a call
back. I needed to leave to go to the
library and at 8:12a I still received no call from Investigations and neither
could I wait for someone to get to me whenever they had a chance. After I submitted the complaint in May this
year, it was a very time-consuming process to get information, and it was not
because of bureaucracy or because the Justice Department is like a “black hole”
as so many say, but rather because many were doing the necessary to avoid
answering my questions or to get me to take their answer and go away without
asking for further clarification. And the answers I got along with the
behaviors I observed were so alarming that they lost their credibility and I
had to write to Glenn Fine about it.
I called Glenn Fine’s office again, and it rang once and then it sounded
like someone quietly picked up the receiver and hung up to disconnect the
call. I re-dialed and got
voicemail. So I left a message that
consisted of explaining that I was given a general OIG number to fax
information to Glenn Fine when what I was sending to Glenn Fine was not
identical to what I was sending for an OIG investigation per se because inasmuch
as it was similar, there was some information that I was only sending to Glenn
Fine and I wouldn’t be sending such information to the Investigations fax
number. I was communicating with Glenn
Fine in particular when faxing there. I also said that it sounded like someone
had picked up the receiver and hung up to disconnect the call previously.
At 8:31a I called Glenn Fine’s office and there was no answer or
voicemail. The phone just rang and rang
and rang. After about 10-20 rings,
again, someone picked up the receiver quietly and hung up quietly.
I needed to leave and so I called Investigations at 8:33a myself rather
than wait for a return call. I inquired
and the only other fax number the young lady could give me was the
Investigations fax number 202 616 9881, which is the one I was using to send
information through the regular route for headquarters. Fortunately, I got one of the operators who
had been helpful to me in the past so that I didn’t have to contend with being
put on hold indefinitely for the purpose of causing me to abandon my
follow-up. She checked to see if the 202
616 9881 number was the only fax number she could give me, and it was. She said she didn’t know a fax number for
Glenn Fine.
It appeared that the matter had just been routed to Investigations
without any further instruction for handling.
And headquarters Investigations would automatically route my
correspondence to the Washington Field Office.
If that was the case, probably nothing would happen because the same people
who got my complaints previously this year, and about whom I complained to
Glenn Fine in May as regarded the handling of the May complaint in particular,
were probably getting it now to handle, unless I could find out something
different from Fine’s office. It would
seem to me that if Glenn Fine instructed that information from me should be
received there rather than at his direct fax number, that I would not have
gotten this response from the operator because such as this operator would be
the one pulling information out of a fax machine and routing it. It sounded to me like the information was
going through routine channels unless it is assigned to someone at headquarters
in some routine way but something more is being done with it that no one would be
told about. That's the only explanation
I can think of to excuse what I have to document in this update.
At 8:34a I called Fine’s office and got voicemail again. I articulated that at the previous call
someone had again picked up the receiver quietly and hung up to disconnect the
caller. And that she didn’t need to
worry because I had things to do and needed to leave and so would not be
calling again. I repeated the previous
message. I said I did not know whether
she was the problem or Glenn Fine, although I would tell my lawyer what I
thought, but I have paid taxes throughout my life and do not appreciate the
service I am getting. And it is
something that affects the public trust and public interest.
I didn’t know what else to say.
It seemed to me she could not have cared less and probably would have
deleted the message without hearing it out.
Actually, I have not found a lawyer yet. This is a difficult matter for
which to obtain representation because it is a criminal matter, but it's the plaintiff’s
side rather than the defendant’s. Plus
one would probably require a law firm for the different types of law expertise
that are necessary to address the whole matter.
And the constitutional issues alone require an exorbitant retainer fee,
plus actual expenses ongoing. So I need
someone to do it for free or on a contingency.
And there is an opulent entity to sue that would well provide for such
as a contingency. And the
someone who takes this on has to be someone who will not defer to a
Bishop if the Bishop is in the wrong.
This last trait is the most difficult one to find. In my last attempt to
get a lawyer, I actually got e-mail to show that the very person who offered me
the information for that lawyer suddenly for no apparent reason changed from
fervently wanting to help me to a rude response that was meant to put me off,
not unlike a lot of attempts I've endured from others to pointedly discourage
me by minimizing the importance of the complaint or the qualification or the
effort expended. The lawyer never got
back to me and I don’t know whether he received the information I sent and my
messages or not.
At 8:36a I called Fine’s number again even though I said I would not be
doing that because I had failed to mention in my previous message that the
person at 202 616 4760 could only give me the general Investigations fax number
and not one for Glenn Fine. But I didn’t
get voicemail this time, but rather the quiet hang up again.
I left the house rather than try following up via Investigations because
it was a Friday, and on Friday the people with whom one might follow up are not
at the office for the most part. The
last time I tried following up through Investigations, I had to keep trying for
a couple of hours for several days before I finally was deigned with a more
respectful response. And anyway, I
wanted a response from Glenn Fine about the complaint and the internal affairs
issues. And again, anyway, I have
followed up by e-mail at Investigations without getting a response. So, if I were going to call, I would be doing
that on another day when I knew that at least the people I wanted to speak to
would be in the office. I was leaving much later than I had intended to
leave already, so I just cut the effort short rather than waste more time. Once I was outside, I realized I forgot
something and had to return home. When I
was ready to leave again, it was 9a, so since I was home and near a phone I
tried Fine’s office again
202 514 3435. There were 2
rings, silence and another quiet hang-up.
I tried again, and again got the quiet hang up. I called again, and got a third quiet hang
up.
It would appear that this individual gets paid for sitting on her thumb,
although I expect that the issue there is not limited to this obvious fact. Even if what I conjecture that could excuse
this handling should turn out to be true, this rudeness is just base behavior
and unseemly for such as the Inspector General's Office. This is similar to the treatment I received
from that office in my follow-up for the letter to Glenn Fine of May 24 about
the Washington Field Office employees, which complaint included the
determination that was made for the May 12 complaint but was not limited only
to that. The response from Fine’s office
then was to concur with the determination the Washington Field Office made then
without addressing the ill-use I received from the Washington Field Office
employees. And to concur with that
determination meant no one bothered to read the file to find out why I was
complaining. And I in fact learned that
what Glenn Fine did was go to Investigations and ask
about it, which sounded like he didn’t look into it himself. And if he didn’t look into it himself, he
could not have discovered that the responses I had received were impertinent
and that the determination was not according to my complaint and allegations
and exhibits. And in the current formal cover letter e-mail to Glenn Fine, one
of the first sent for the August 31, 2006 complaint for which I requested his
involvement given the past issues with the Washington Field Office and the
misrepresentation of the file on the Freedom of Information Act response, I
described that the secretary in his office had kept me on hold with the
expectation that I would hang up and abandon my follow-up. This apparently was not corrected. I have no way of knowing if Glenn Fine saw
what I sent, but I did fax a notice to him advising that the e-mails were
coming via the general OIG e-mail address and that these would have an
attention to him on the subject line to help identify them immediately. And I verified that that fax that notified
about this was in fact received, by a different secretary than this one,
though.
Bluntly put, when push comes to shove, they logistically do not permit
follow up on internal affairs issues because this is not the first time I've
tried. That secretary would not feel
comfortable doing that if she knew she could suffer consequences for it because
if she works there, however ignorant she might be, she can’t be feeble-minded.
If you fax stuff, and they tell you not to fax it there but to somewhere
else where the issue you're trying to get addressed will not be addressed and
also SHOULD NOT be addressed, and if you call and they persistently hang up on
you or do the necessary logistically to keep you from obtaining the information
you require of them, and you've apprised them of the nature of your
communication so that it's known to be legitimate, then what can a citizen with
a legitimate complaint do if the government acts this way?
I am protesting at the Office of Inspector General currently, their
Washington Field Office located in
I filed a Freedom of Information Act request soon after the May
complaint, and expedite treatment was granted immediately although the request
for information was basically denied as I explain elsewhere in this
website. However, expedite treatment of
the appeal was denied and it appears they didn’t bother with qualification for
expedite treatment but only denied it as though the decision had been made with
full information. If what they accessed
didn't have the necessary qualification for expedite treatment, I had other
qualification that was not part of any government file that I also offered, and
so I happen to know for a fact they did not even bother with qualifying their decision
to deny it. I wrote a few times to learn
about judicial review and have not received a response yet. I then called
September 18, 2006, and learned that from this point on, I’m on my own. I can take it to court, pro se or with a
lawyer, but there is no other procedure to obtain redress without going to
court. And if you’re asking for expedite
treatment, and you have to go to court to get it, chances are that whatever you
need the expedite treatment for will have long elapsed by the time you get redress. I mean, they’re backlogged, but I don’t think
it’s so bad that I’ll gain any time from going to court about it, although
doing so would correct the record to reflect that there was qualification for
expedite treatment that was blatantly disregarded. Because this denial of expedite treatment is
also a misrepresentation of the file because the evidence I offered to qualify
my request if government records did not have this information was not
accessed at all. The decision was made
almost immediately, but without contacting me first, as I already said.
And it's worth waiting for the response first from the appeal because it
might be necessary to go to court about that too, and I might as well do it all
at once.