THE MENINO administration has a legal obligation to produce the elusive e-mails from Michael Kineavy, the mayor’s top political enforcer. But what’s emerging instead is possible evidence of stonewalling and deception - especially now that another computer of Kineavy’s has surfaced. If anything is clear, it’s that the Menino administration cannot be entrusted to investigate the matter on its own. Attorney General Martha Coakley should take over.
The e-mail messages are significant because they could shed light on what goes on behind the scenes at City Hall, where Menino is reputed to exercise dictatorial control of decision-making. But the administration’s failure to produce legitimate public documents is revealing in its own way - as a possible ploy to avoid embarrassing revelations in the middle of election season. Kineavy’s decision yesterday to take an indefinite leave of absence doesn’t settle the matter. Mayoral challenger Michael Flaherty is right to demand an independent investigation of Kineavy’s e-mail activity.
Some of Kineavy’s missives had been the subject of a subpoena in a federal corruption investigation of former senator Dianne Wilkerson. Others were the subject of a Globe public records request earlier this year. At first, City Hall responded by saying Kineavy’s e-mails couldn’t be recovered - and then went on to find thousands of them. Officials explained that he had deleted items in such a way that the messages were not saved on city backup servers. That only raised serious questions of whether anyone at City Hall instructed Kineavy or any other city official on ways to erase e-mail trails.
The administration also insisted initially that Kineavy had used the same computer for the whole period covered by the records request. Then, on Monday, city officials acknowledged the existence of a second computer that Kineavy used. Just days after the Globe’s April 1 request, Kineavy apparently reported problems with his computer, and received a replacement on April 24.
Kineavy insists that he has no memory even of receiving a new computer, despite having made several requisition requests. And this comes from a man with a reputation for keeping exquisite track of the comings and goings at City Hall, regarding both policy and politics. “I feel like a nitwit for not remembering,’’ he said yesterday in a telephone interview. “I want to do whatever is best to recoup the public trust.’’
The only way to recoup that trust is to retrieve and release the e-mails from both of Kineavy’s computers before the Nov. 3 election. Secretary of State William Galvin says he is still waiting for a complete copy of the images of Kineavy’s hard drives, which now rest with StoneTurn, a group of computer forensics experts handpicked by the Menino administration to recover the e-mails. Galvin lacks subpoena power. But Coakley doesn’t. She needs to gain physical control of the physical hardware in this case before anything goes missing.
The Menino administration has exhausted its credibility on this issue, and can’t regain it until Kineavy’s missing messages become public.
