An IRE Journal cover story for the moneyand politics issue.
Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. The IRE Journal > Mar/Apr 2006
POLITICAL PATROL
PATTERN OF TROOPER CRONYISM MARKED BY FIXED TICKETS, QUESTIONABLE PROMOTIONS
By Brad Schrade
A statewide scandal that led to the forced ousters of the three top officials in the Tennessee Highway Patrol began with a tip about a drunken driving stop in a rural county about 170 miles from Nashville.
It would end with stories showing a department rife with problems ranging from promotions being influenced by political contributions to badge giveaways that amounted to get-out-of-jail-free cards for political donors. We would investigate the problems through databases and interviews, getting more and more tips as we published our findings.
But back to the beginning: A police report of that DUI arrest, along with an anonymous letter explaining some of the back story, reached the desk of my colleague, Trent Seibert. The letter appeared to be the voice of someone outraged within the Highway Patrol.
It described in detail how two veteran state troopers had testified against a young trooper who had arrested the grandson of a powerful west Tennessee Democratic fundraiser and one-time patronage chief. The judge dropped the DUI charge following the two older troopers' testimony.
While the thrust of the letter was a complaint about political favoritism, Seibert found something more curious in the incident report narrative. The grandson had flashed an "honorary captain" badge and told the arresting trooper: "I'm an officer just like you. I'm a trooper too. I've got a badge just like yours. You can't treat me like this, I will tell the colonel on you."
That prompted Seibert to request all records from the Highway Patrol related to the honorary captains program, which we would eventually learn was extensive.
Meanwhile, I received an anonymous call from a frustrated trooper from another part of the state, complaining the patrol's promotion process was tainted by politics. He said even low-level civil service positions went to campaign contributors and troopers with political connections. Testing, interviews and job performance did not really matter, he said
The trooper also mentioned to me the department issued official-looking badges and trooper identification cards to the politically connected and campaign contributors. Experienced troopers knew that when they stopped people with these badges, it meant they had some political ties to the upper ranks, and ticketing them could mean trouble, he said.
Later, Seibert filled me in on the letter he had received about the DUI. We thought we were onto something with these separate tips, but the Highway Patrol was dragging its feet delivering records about the program.
When the records arrived, they included a list of the names and Social security numbers of those receiving badges since 2002, about 360 people. With the help of our editor, Jennifer Peebles, we started Googling, searching campaign finance records, and using the Accurint and LexisNexis commercial databases to learn about these people.
The Social security numbers were vital because they helped us verify identities in databases. (The department did not provide us with the honorary captains' addresses.) Middle initials, where they were listed, were useful in tracking people. Accurint's "People Search" feature led us from their names and Social security numbers to their home and work addresses.
Highly political agency
It became clear that the program was a perk for political insiders, governor's staffers, celebrities and campaign donors. There were virtually no controls, background checks or program oversight.
When our Sunday story ran, response from readers was strong. Tips flowed in about other problems in the patrol. There was outrage from readers at a program that, as one critic in the story said, was clearly a "get-out-of-jail-free card."
Gov. Phil Bredesen said he was unaware of the program's size and within days he banished the badge giveaway.
But the story was just warming up.
That same week the Highway Patrol was promoting about 50 officers to various ranks, including sergeants, lieutenants and captains. We got a tip that the two sergeants who had testified on behalf of the Democratic matron's grandson in our initial tip were among those promoted to lieutenant.
The kicker: They had put down the woman's name, or those of family members, as references on their promotion applications. The family had even called the department to put in a good word for one of the troopers.
As the story moved along, sources recognized that we were serious about scrutinizing the Highway Patrol, which had a longstanding reputation of being highly political. The governor scrapped all promotions pending a review. The state safety commissioner ordered a review of the west Tennessee DUI case.
Seibert was dispatched to the location of the DUI stop, an old World War II airstrip near the Mississippi River. He combed through county records and interviewed locals. Based on what he found, we reported that the testimony of the two troopers who were later promoted was wrong - the location of the DUI arrest was on public land, and thus, the arrest should have held up in court. (The DUI charge had been dismissed on the two troopers' testimony that the land in question was privately owned.)
After nearly four weeks of writing stories, our network of Highway Patrol sources now stretched across the state. Everyone was telling us the same tale: Promotions are tied to politics and campaign contributions.
The picture that emerged from these interviews, most of them on background, was of an agency that had operated this way for years, under both Democratic and Republican leadership. The department was so secretive that information had been kept from officers about promotions and how the scoring system worked. This lack of transparency had created a great deal of suspicion and distrust among the rank-and-file. We tapped into this and gained credibility with troopers with each story we wrote.
Predetermined promotions
Once the initial flurry of stories slowed, my editors wanted me to take a hard look at the ties between politics and promotions. We focused on troopers who were campaign contributors.
We already had in hand a computer database file from the state's Registry of Election Finance showing all contributors to the governor in 2004. We then also paid for another database, a Microsoft Access file from the nonprofit Institute on Money in State Politics in Montana, listing all contributions to Bredesen's 2002 campaign.
We cross-referenced the records of contributors with a list of promoted officers we acquired from the Highway Patrol under the state's open records law.
In combing through the paper records in some officers' personnel files, we also noticed mentions of recommendation letters that had been "keyed in."
It turned out the Highway Patrol kept references made on behalf of officers in a spreadsheet, so staffers could track who was recommending troopers to be promoted or hired. We acquired this spreadsheet file under the open records law.
It was another who's who of political donors and insiders. Some troopers had as many as 20 references from politically connected people, many of them with no law enforcement expertise. Some of the references' names we recognized from the list of honorary captains that started the whole investigation.
A source also had sent me a secret list of "proposed promotions." It had been created by high-level Highway Patrol officials, and it reinforced my original tipster's claim that the promotions were predetermined. We plugged those names into a spreadsheet and cross-referenced them with our contribution list.
Spreadsheets we created showed that lower-scoring officers who had political connections were regularly recommended for promotions over higher-scoring officers.
Throughout this process I was reminded of something veteran investigative reporter Eric Nalder drove home at an IRE conference session on "breaking and entering" an organization: When investigating an organization, get your hands on any rosters, personnel files, address lists, yearbooks, newsletters and organization charts. (see Nalder's investigative tips on page 15.) They will help in myriad ways in understanding how the place works, its history, relationships, personnel and customs. For us, they were important tools in verifying campaign contributors.
Three months after the original "honorary captains" piece ran, we reported that two-thirds of Highway Patrol promotions went to officers who contributed money to the governor or had family members or political patrons who were contributors.
Of those, more than half had test scores lower than other officers who were not promoted.
That story set off a whole new wave of tips and stories. They included stories about an officer who was rehired after forging a judge's signature to fix a ticket; an officer who was recommended for promotion after helping fix a speeding ticket for the deputy governor; and how the department often turned a blind eye when its own officers got in trouble.
Investigations launched
"It is not a pretty picture," Bredesen said. "There is a pattern of cronyism evident in this that is clearly wrong and needs rooting out."
He ordered an investigation into the Highway Patrol and ordered criminal background checks on all 855 uniformed troopers. More than 50 had some charges in their background, some felonies.
Since then, four officers have been slated to be fired. The three top officials in the department were forced out in early December. The state Senate has begun its own inquiry into the agency, and the governor has hired an outside consultant to fix what's broken at the Highway Patrol.
A criminal investigation into a suspected ticket-fixing scandal and other questionable activity was launched. The local district attorney has since opined that it's legal for troopers to fix tickets as favors so long as they don't derive benefit - sparking additional public outrage.
The governor summed up his frustration with the situation in an interview in late November, describing why he launched the investigation into the agency.
"There is an issue for me in how the department operates," Bredesen said. "My reaction was, Tm getting expletive tired of The Tennessean doing our work for us. Let's go do some work.'"
BY BRAD SCHRADE
THK (NASHVILLE) TENNESSEAN
Brad Schrade covers state government for The Tennessean.
