The Cover-Up Continues at the IRS

Following Judge Sullivan’s orders, IRS officials have submitted a sworn statement attempting to explain the loss of Lois Lerner’s emails — but it doesn’t get us much closer to understanding how they went missing.

It appears Lerner’s hard drive went through the hands of two IT technicians at the IRS before it was determined to be unrecoverable. The hard drive was then erased and sent to an outside recycler to be destroyed. It was never tagged with a barcode during this process, only identified with the name of Lois Lerner.

One interesting observation was made by John Minsek, the second technician to examine the hard drive. When he opened Lerner’s hard drive, he noticed “well-defined concentric scoring around the center of the top platter.” This indicates that there was physical damage done to the place the data was stored — circles gouged into the equipment, in fact. Where did that come from?

The Deputy Inspector General for Investigations at TIGTA, an office of the Inspector General responsible for investigating “lapses in IRS employee integrity,” was least helpful. In summary, Timothy Camus said they have opened an investigation into the email loss but can’t give any information about it.

Judicial Watch, the agency whose FOIA request prompted the special inquiry, is not convinced or satisfied by the information offered. President Tom Fitton says the IRS is treating the judge’s order “as a joke.” “Frankly, it seems the cover-up continues.”

Funny that a 24-page statement would only raise more questions.

Just what was in those emails that is so vital to protect? With every non-answer, the suspicion grows that someone was determined that those emails never reach the public eye.

Where will the investigation go from here? Are there more places investigators can look within the IRS?   Will it be necessary to subpoena other federal agencies for copies of emails sent from Lerner’s account?

The only thing that is clear in this case is that the government continues to lie to the American people.