✈ ✈ ✈ TSA HIDES KEY WITNESS IN VIOLATION OF JUDGE'S FINAL THIRD ORDER ✈ ✈ ✈
The former TSA Director of the Office of Sensitive Security Information ("SSI"), Andrew Colsky, provided some shocking testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight & Government Reform Committee ("the Oversight Committee"). His testimony is summarized in its May 29, 2014 bipartisan "Joint Staff Report." He gave Congress an email he sent to eight TSA attorneys that he was "very uncomfortable" about sworn testimony he gave in order to support MacLean's termination and that he does not "know what to honestly call SSI anymore." He testified to Congress that his office was under "extreme pressure" to mark "embarrassing information...that was not by any stretch of the imagination at all SSI."
Obviously MacLean's attorney would want to take a deposition from the most senior person in charge of the TSA's SSI programs and training at the time when MacLean made his disclosure to MSNBC, July 29, 2003.
At the last second of the day MacLean's attorneys—who flew in from Boston—were scheduled to depose David Graceson at TSA headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, Colsky was mysteriously forced by TSA headquarters to testify in place of David Graceson. This was in violation of a U.S. Merit Systems Protection ("MSPB") Administrative Judge's subpoena and third final order. The MSPB judge ordered former SSI Director Graceson to testify because he had the best knowledge of SSI regulations and training in effect at the time MacLean made his disclosure. Colsky was an attorney for the U.S. Postal Service when MacLean made his disclosure and not working for the TSA or probably has a clue about the TSA's SSI programs in effect in July 2003. Prior to violating the MSPB judge's order by switching out Graceson for Colsky, the TSA vigorously fought to never allow Graceson's deposition. The MSPB judge DENIED THREE MOTIONS (motion to quash subpoena, motion to reconsider quashing a subpoena, and finally, a motion for "interlocutory appeal" to the full three-member MSPB in Washington DC) by the TSA to prevent MacLean's attorney from questioning Graceson. After Graceson failed to show up for his court-ordered deposition, MacLean complained to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco protesting the TSA's contempt of the MSPB judge's final order.
What's most ironic of the TSA's willful violation forcing Colsky to testify in place of Graceson is the fact TSA initially offered Graceson as its best expert on SSI during July 2003 before it fought hard to block his testimony.
The TSA was never held accountable for violating the MSPB's order to allow MacLean to depose the Graceson. Graceson was the in charge of all SSI programs and training when MacLean made his disclosure in July 2003. It's apparent that the TSA was terribly afraid of Graceson testifying in favor of MacLean.
The MSPB judge who replaced the judge who ordered Graceson's testimony, Franklin M. Kang, denied MacLean's request to have Colsky and Graceson appear at MacLean's November 5, 2009 MSPB hearing.
Below is the final order from the San Francisco MSPB judge that was a denial of a "motion for interlocutory appeal" to the full MSPB in Washington DC. The TSA never appealed this order, therefore it was obligated to allow MacLean's attorney to depose Graceson: