November 9, 2010
Henke
testified his commander had assigned him duties with regard to the Blunt
investigation. He'd had complaints that
drivers license photos had been accessed, printed, and shown to the public in
an internal investigation. He was to see
if the photos had been used. He
testified he interviewed a variety of people including Blunt and Rob
Forward. He testified that Forward's
attitude changed when he asked to interview Sandy Blunt. He said he wouldn't call it hostile, but he
expected more from a fellow state employee and he never was allowed to
interview Sandy Blunt. When asked if
Forward cooperated with his requests, he said he expected more at times.
Henke
said he was eventually assigned to the Long investigation by his District
Commander, Capt. Eric Peterson. He
testified he met with Attorney General Stenehjem who gave him the scope of his
investigation and wanted him to look into the whistleblower allegations from
both Long and Todd Flannagan. He said
that Long and Flannagan had both cooperated with law enforcement so they filed
for whisteblower protection against retaliation. He was to find the reason for their
termination or suspension, compile that information, and bring it to the
Attorney General's office.
Henke
stated he did not interview witnesses, but requested information from WSI
personnel files through staff attorney Anne Green. Henke stated he submitted his report to
Attorney General Stenehjem, but had not directly submitted it to Peter Weltz in
Grand Forks. Henke said he became aware of the lengthy
report Long had submitted regarding violations of law at WSI, but he was not
asked to investigate them. Henke said it
was not unusual to have an investigation where there were no witnesses interviewed.
Mitch
Armstrong then questioned Henke.
Armstrong established that Henke was specifically assigned to determine
whether Long was fired in retaliation for filing whistleblower protection. Henke said yes. When asked whether any charges were brought,
Henke said no.
It was
established that Henke had received the initial packet of Long's allegations,
but as far as Henke knew no one had ever investigated that.
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