Kane aide defending contempt charges over email search
Patrick Reese, a top aide to Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane, arrives for his contempt hearing Monday at the Montgomery County courthouse in Norristown. Reese faces charges he snooped on emails to keep tabs on a grand jury investigation involving Kane. Montgomery County prosecutors charged Reese with criminal contempt the same day in August they charged Kane with perjury, obstruction and other charges.
Patrick Reese, left, a top aide to Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane, walks outside of the courtroom during a recess in his contempt hearing Monday at the Montgomery County courthouse in Norristown.
Patrick Reese, left, a top aide to Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane, arrives for his contempt hearing Monday at the Montgomery County courthouse in Norristown.
NORRISTOWN – A top aide to Pennsylvania’s attorney general went to court Monday to defend himself against charges he illegally accessed emails to keep tabs on a grand jury investigation involving his boss, Kathleen Kane.
A lawyer for Patrick Reese has said his client wasn’t aware of a court order protecting the emails, although witnesses said Monday it was widely discussed in the office, at least among Kane’s top staff.
Reese is a close confidante of Kane’s who often serves as her driver.
Montgomery County prosecutors charged him with criminal contempt the same day in August they charged Kane with perjury and obstruction.
Kane, meanwhile, was charged with leaking secret grand jury material to a newspaper to embarrass rivals and then lying about it under oath. She denies the charges and insists she is being targeted for taking on a corrupt, old-boy network in Pennsylvania politics and exposing state employees who she said exchanged pornographic or racist emails.
In court Monday, an investigator in Kane’s office testified that he searched staff emails looking not only for pornography but any correspondence with a statehouse reporter for The Philadelphia Inquirer. Witness David Peifer disclosed that he had been granted immunity in exchange for his cooperation. However, he said he did not believe his searches violated the judge’s order protecting the grand jury evidence.
First Deputy Attorney General Bruce Beemer testified that he and other key staffers discussed the judge’s order but said he did not think a memo went out to the full staff. Kane thought the order was overbroad and would put a crimp on investigative work, Beemer said. She ordered her staff to appeal it.
Chief Deputy Laura Ditka said she called Reese after the appeal was heard in court, in an effort to reach Kane and fill her in. But she twice had to leave a message – leaving it unclear if Reese explicitly heard her or Kane discuss the protective order.
Montgomery County Judge William Carpenter is conducting the hearing over the order he issued last year to protect the grand jury probe of Kane.
Reese is a former small-town police chief in northeastern Pennsylvania. He earns just under $100,000 a year as a supervisory special agent in Kane’s office.