YNOT – A Denver attorney has filed a federal lawsuit seeking the names of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission staff members who viewed internet pornography on the job. If his suit is successful, Kevin D. Evans said he will release the names to the public in hope of deterring other federal employees from wasting tax dollars in similar pursuits.He also said since some of the disciplined SEC employees were attorneys and their actions constituted malfeasance, they deserve to be disciplined by their local bar associations, as well.
According to Evans, the SEC violated federal law when it declined to reveal the identities of the 33 current and former staff members and contractors whose unauthorized surfing was uncovered during an internal investigation earlier this year. Evans labeled the workers’ actions wasteful and abusive.
“What these individuals did is the equivalent of falsely billing a client (in this case taxpayers like you and me),” Evans told The Washington Post in an e-mail. “If one does this in private practice one has disciplinary action taken against one, and if the fraud is large enough there is the potential for additional action. Lawyers should not be excused simply because they work for the government.”
He also told the Post unmasking the miscreants is essential to changing public employees’ behavior across the board.
“There is no real deterrence without knowing that one’s name will be exposed if one engages in such abuse of taxpayer resources and trust,” he opined.
An SEC investigation found 33 employees spent hours on the federal payroll using SEC computers and internet connections to surf porn sites. The majority of the infractions occurred over the past two and one-half years. Seventeen of the offenders were senior staff members earning between $100,000 and $222,000 annually, according to ABC News.
Among the most egregious of the offenses were those committed by a senior attorney in the SEC’s Washington headquarters. According to the report, he spent as many as eight hours daily downloading porn. Eventually he filled up not only his SEC computer’s hard drive with explicit images, but also several file boxes of CDs and DVDs that he stored in his office.
None of the workers was fired, but after the investigation eight resigned, six were suspended, six received informal warnings and five received formal reprimands.
Sen. Charles E. Grassley [R-Iowa] also wants the names, pay grades and disciplinary information for the SEC porn surfers. The investigation was initiated at Grassley’s request.
