Report on internal investigation should answer key questions

What isn’t in the report will be as telling as what is, if questions go unanswered.

COLUMBUS DISPATCH

COLUMBUS — When the results of an internal investigation of sexual-harassment complaints in Attorney General Marc Dann’s office is released today, it almost certainly will give the public its most detailed look yet inside the office.

But will it answer these key questions?

1. Will there be further disciplinary action against Anthony Gutierrez and Leo Jennings, or new discipline for anyone else?

For example, Edgar C. Simpson, Dann’s top nonlegal aide, was named in the complaints of Cindy Stankoski and Vanessa Stout as apparently knowing about the problems but doing nothing. Simpson supervised Gutierrez and Jennings. The women said others were involved in trying to stall or cover up their complaints, too.

2. What did Dann know and when did he know it?

The most egregious example in the complaints of sexual harassment took place at a condo Dann shared with Gutierrez and Jennings, after Dann encouraged Stankoski to accompany Gutierrez there for pizza and booze.

Or will the probe by Ben Espy and Julie Pfeiffer take a narrow tact and not delve into their boss’s potential involvement?

3. Were the women who filed the complaints treated differently during the investigation than others?

When the two were brought in for second interviews near the end of the probe, their attorney vociferously protested the nature of the questions, saying the victims were being treated as perpetrators. Dann’s office vigorously denied that charge.

4. What did Jennings do to get suspended?

Gutierrez was suspended after a quick first stage of the investigation and his office cleaned out. But Jennings was tossed after new information was revealed the weekend after the complaints were first publicized by The Dispatch. Speculation — and that’s all it is at this point — centers on whether Jennings tried to somehow hinder the investigation. Stankoski’s journal alleges that Jennings and Gutierrez shredded personnel records. Jennings has denied that.

Further, Jennings tried to back other news media off the story after The Dispatch’s piece, claiming the article contained legally “actionable” errors.

5. What role did text messages play in this investigation?

Gutierrez’s wife, Lisa, may have intercepted risque text messages between Vanessa Stout and her husband, or perhaps more urgent messages that Stankoski sent Sept. 10 from the condo. If so, did she forward those messages to anyone or share them with Alyssa Lenhoff, the attorney general’s wife and a close friend? Did Lenhoff then show those messages to Dann? If so, what did he do about them or how did he react?

6. Did Dann ignore red-flag warnings about Gutierrez before he hired him, including his 2006 drunken-driving arrest when Dann was forced to take him home, plus a bankruptcy, dozens of liens and unpaid state and federal tax bills?