How public records from King County’s Major Crimes Unit exposed Kevin Thomas Hulten and Jon Rudicil’s Racketeering Enterprise

King County Major Crimes Unit’s Files documenting that Kevin Thomas Hulten, attorney Jack Connelly and Jon Rudicil should be in jail for Racketeering and money laundering

     

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Kevin Hulten and Jon Rudicil were on Snohomish County’s payroll at the time they were assisting attorney Jack Connelly in his efforts to beat the Honorable Senator Jennelle Darnielle. Public records from Snohomish County confirm that Kevin Hulten and Jon Rudicil never paid a single cent of tax on their RICO activities.

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From: Reardon, Aaron

Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2012 9:47 PM

To: Hulten, Kevin

Cc: Rudicil, Jon

Subject: Re: DRAFT legislative agenda/PDR law

Any change that is pursued must be constructive. Going after requesters is punitive.

I’ve talked I Dow and Pat at length about slight modifications. The PDR is a public right and serves a public interest. Any change must do the same.

Politicians and bureaucrats serve the public. Thus, if a change is pursued intended to make the life of a public employee easier and make the publics access to public information more difficult then it is inherently contradictory to the act.

I hate to sound like I’m taking a “suck it up, butter cup” approach” but the fact is any change pursued must be premised on improving the act, maintaing the publics access and minimizing abuse.

We’re on the same page.

BTW, I had to laugh about the issue of newspapers. That’s actually more interesting than funny. One could write a term paper on the differences based on ownership and audience – ie local weeklies v dailies owned by out of state corps. And, dailies locally owned v out of state corporate ownership.

Reminds me of the the age old question “What’s in a name?” ST is Seattle based but locally owned. The Herald is a local office but driven and owned by DC. Further, it would be interesting to see what their respective corporates target as their profit percentage. There’s your Masters thesis.

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On Oct 30, 2012, at 8:48 PM, “Hulten, Kevin” <Kevin.Hulten@co.snohomish.wa.us> wrote:

Great stuff. I agree that requiring verification for PDRs as a legislative agenda item would be a waste of a chit and an invitation for enemies to incorrectly smear our office as opaque. Further, the fact that the example given to illustrate the supposed problem involved a named requester – “Our friend Edmond” – illustrates what opponents will label as the true motivations behind this idea: the ability to question the identity of a requester based on the objectionable or politically inconvenient subject matter of the request. Would staff be questioning the identity of this requestor if the request was for, say, Charter Review documents? Doubtful. Which is why we’d be laughed out of Olympia and skewered in the press. I think you are right on.

I did tell Gage about my conversations last session with major left-leaning Open Government stakeholders who voiced an interest in working with municipalities in the background to address some serious issues before an inevitable whiplash occurs. They know that the public isn’t going to like reading about another small town that can’t afford to plow its streets or light its Christmas tree because of individuals with vendettas and the ability to request  thousands and thousands of documents at a time, often with no intent to pick up or pay for the order at all. It was my feeling that there may be a willingness to introduce some sort of cost-based pay-to-play system after a certain threshold is crossed. Or, perhaps a system where requests are always free, but those who wish to have expedited service can pay a significant premium to subsidize the rest. Something like that, maybe. Alternatively, the “stick” approach might work too: severe penalties for serial abuses or those who use public records to harm government or to harass or intimidate public servants (but requestor side regs stay the same). Finally, I think the leg might even consider a fee for businesses that use public records as part of a for profit business model. Newspapers for example.

Anyway, it’s a stimulating topic. Would love to continue later.

K

On Oct 30, 2012, at 6:02 PM, “Reardon, Aaron” <agr@co.snohomish.wa.us> wrote:

Thanks. Lets discuss tomorrow. I’ll refrain from being sarcastic or snarky.

This may not be as simple a it appears.

My initial feedback is multifaceted:

1. Regarding the issue of filling PDR’s differently based upon the requester, I’m only aware of one area where this applies and it is in respect to PDR’s by inmates. I’m not versed on the statute so you may want to look it up.

If its not an inmate submitting the PDR then his choice or whoever’s choice it is to fulfill the request differently based on the requester may be exposing the county to significant liability. I don’t believe the govt. can pick and choose in this case. It must be standardized and consistent. This raises a lot of questions. If your recitation is accurate, this is an issue that really can’t wait to be resolved so we need to be more versed ASAP. This is a short term operations item – not legislative

2. As for adding an item to our legislative agenda re: anonymous requests, candidly that’s a non starter. The legislature and AG specifically did not differentiate when they have repeatedly amended the law to increase openness. It’s not as if this issue hasn’t been raised in the past because it has. They’ve made a conscious decision to allow ANYONE access to public records. I could go on and on but suffice to say, whoever pushes for this change couldn’t argue their way out of a wet paper sack.
3. There’s a practical and political twist to the request a well. First, it wouldn’t even get a hearing if it even got a sponsor. We have a lot of substantive issues we need to press and I don’t feel like wasting my time or yours on a lost cause with a losing argument. Second, how do you think our constituents would view this? I think poorly. With all the important issues facing us (Transpo, higher-ed, workforce training, human needs, law and justice, environmental infrastructure, etc) their govt leader chose to ignore them and focus on a petty PDR issue? Not a good sell to those who pay us to work for them.
4. I’ll admit I’m a bit hardened but, we’re talking about public records. The key word being public. Everything I’ve produced has been made public. Big deal. The same would actually apply to you and Gary as well. Everybody has our emails, phone logs, calendars, etc. What’s the big deal? Heck, I think we should just put them all on-line anyway.
5. Given the change in technology anybody can make a request for records big and small. And, more than likely they exist. I understand the point of costs but it also cost less nowadays to produce the records than in years past when everything was on paper. They should be working on trying to develop a system that makes records recovery more cost effective and less time consuming instead of limiting the publics access to public materials.

Just my initial thoughts. Let’s chat further tomorrow.

Thanks

AGR

CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT:  This message may contain protected information by the attorney-client and/or work product privilege.  If this message was sent to you in error, any use, disclosure or

distribution of its contents is prohibited.  If you receive this

message in error, please contact me at the telephone number or e-mail

address listed above and delete this message without printing,

copying, or forwarding it.  Thank you.

On Oct 30, 2012, at 5:28 PM, “Hulten, Kevin” <Kevin.Hulten@co.snohomish.wa.us> wrote:

Hey Boss –

I forgot to send this to you but Gage talked to me Monday about a potential legislative agenda item. He already approached Somers and said Somers was interested.

However, I can’t help but wonder if the County is exposed to potential litigation if in fact we are applying different internal standards on PDR responses based upon the perceived identity (or lack thereof) of the requestor. Just wanted to pass this along.

Kevin

From: Hulten, Kevin Sent: Monday, October 29, 2012 9:39 AM To: Hulten, Kevin Subject: DRAFT Memo anonymous PDRs

Gage spoke to me after cabinet today to state that he had approached Dave Somers about adding the problem surrounding “anonymous”  public disclosure requests to the County legislative agenda.

Gage said that requests like the recent request from “our friend Edmond” present all sorts of problems for the county to fufil.

Gage said that request are redacted differently based upon whom the recipient is. I reconfirmed – stating that it was my impression that agencies must fulfill requests without regard to whom the requestor is. He said no, certain agencies redact differently based upon whom the requestor is. I spoke to Gage about my impression of the legislative prospects of this approach and we left it at that.