Attorney General John Kroger today released additional documents — multiple preliminary drafts of the final investigative report into the relationship between Portland Mayor Sam Adams and Beau Breedlove.
These earlier drafts contain scathing assessments about the mayor’s credibility; his veracity and investigators’ unhappiness about the mayor’s reluctance to cooperate with the investigation.
Those criticisms were then either removed from the final report or substantially watered down.
For instance, in various drafts there is a section labeled “Adams admits to lying about the salient facts.”
Adams has admitted that he lied about the nature of his relationship with Beau Breedlove, both publicly and privately. According to Adams, these lies began with his statements to [former boyfriend] John Veniza [sic] in July of 2005 and ended with his interview with Willamette Week on January 19, 2009. In September of 2007, when confronted with rumors that he and Breedlove had a sexual relationship while Breedlove was 17 years old, Adams denied the allegation. As part of his private and public denials, Adams crafted a story that featured him in a mentoring relationship with Breedlove. Adams admits and Breedlove concurs that, in the summer of 2007, Adams called Breedlove and asked him to lie if questioned about the sexual nature of their relationship. At the time, Breedlove agreed to conceal the truth. Adams has admitted that his description of his relationship with Breedlove in 2007 and 2008 was predicated on a lie and that he made a number of inconsistent statements about the details of his interactions with Breedlove to further his inaccurate portrayal of their relationship.
The preceding section was entirely eliminated from the final version, which focused instead on Breedlove’s lack of credibility. Here’s what the final version said:
“There are serious questions about the credibility of Breedlove’s account, due to his prior inconsistent statements, the lack of corroborating witnesses or evidence, his attempt to gain personally from matters related to his involvement with Adams and his prior criminal record.”
That final version is a pretty damning assessment of the alleged victim of the story and it is also a very different conclusion from an earlier version of the conclusion that began this way:
“Both Adams and Breedlove have little credibility as to their reports of the events that are the subject of this investigation. Adams lied repeatedly about his sexual relationship with Breedlove. Then, while admitting the relationship and explaining to the media that he was fully cooperating with the investigation, Adams’ lawyers were hampering the investigation. Adams has every motive to lie about kissing Breedlove before Breedlove before Breedlove’s 18th birthday…”
The final version is silent not only about Adams previous lies and any assessment of his credibility but also offers a completely different version of his cooperation.
Here’s an early version:
“Adams publicly claimed to be cooperating with this investigation but his legal team in fact dragged their collective feet throughout. DOJ first requested access to Adams’ computer and phone records on January 29 but it was not until April 6 that everything was finally turned over. Throughout the first three months of the investigations, Adams’ legal team repeatedly delayed access to computer and phone equipment.”
In the final version, a section titled “ADAMS’ COOPERATION” begins
“Adams submitted to a full interview with DOJ on May 28, 2009. Adams agreed to be interviewed without limit, advance terms or conditions. He appeared to fully answer each of the questions posed by this investigation. The interview lasted approximately 3 1/2 hours.”
In addition to presenting a far rosier picture of Adams than earlier drafts, the final investigation report omits two interesting facts about Breedlove that were contained in earlier versions:
First, investigators faced a tight deadline as they pursued the question of whether alleged kisses might have constituted criminal behavior: the statute of limitations for sexual abuse in the third degree is four years from the victim’s 18th birthday: that for Breedlove would be Thursday, June 25.
And while the final report elaborates at great length the ways in which Breedlove allegedly attempted to destroy Adams for “notoriety and financial gain,” there is no mention of a seemingly important way that was written about in earlier versions — that Breedlove declined to help himself or to bolster his story:
“Breedlove declined to cooperate by identifying potential witnesses who could confirm that he had described these events to others at the time they occurred.”
The AG’s office passed along 13 different versions of the report. It’s unclear what order they fall in, so we’ve numbered them arbitrarily and posted them as PDFs below.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13.
- The Sam Adams Report Highlights Here are
- Bob Ball Reacts to AG Kroger’s Adams Report Bob Ball,
- Beau Breedlove Tells KGW That Mayor Sam Adams Lied About What Happened And That He’s Mad About It (UPDATED with comment from Adams’ spokesman) Beau Bree
- Adams Admission Reaction: Adams and Breedlove’s Stories Differ (Plus KATU Reports A New Detail on Breedlove) In an int
- Adams’ Admission Reaction: Breedlove Says Adams Did Not Ask Him to Lie Beau Breed
Tags: beau breedlove, John Kroger, Sam Adams
Shazam! Surprise, surprise, surprise! The AG wouldn’t want to hurt Sam’s feelings. I wonder if he had it poll tested? The only thing missing in this cover-up are the sheets.
And….the DO”J”, was doing all this revised work as a favor to WHO?
We are seeing with our own eyes that the many of these alterations are night and day.
Bogdanski said it stunk in “JERSEY” politically…the more this goes on, I live in SE PDX, we can smell city hall from here.
Randy said the “wind was out of the recall sails!” (really a dumb/numb comment)
Hey RANDY…THOSE DARK CLOUDS,they may CR– on your parade(almost said something I SHOULD not have.
Holy crap.
This is really, really, really frustrating.
Hello WWeek
Is the Kauffman mentioned below in the Oregonian related to Sam Adams’ relatively new spokesperson Roy Kauffman?
Why are my previous posts not suitable for Wweek?
“Adams hired Weaver, one of the city’s top criminal defense attorneys. The night Kroger launched his investigation, a lawyer working with Weaver, Samuel Kauffman, and a private investigator, Kara Beus, showed up at Breedlove’s apartment at 11 p.m. to interview him. It’s common for defense attorneys to try to capture statements from key witnesses as early as possible.”
Hi All,
Please know that the Recall is dedicated to holding Sam Adams accountable for willfully lying to get elected, orchestrating an elaborate cover-up and abusing his power via a positive, honorable and transparent campaign.
More info can be found at http://www.recallsamadams.com
Together we will make our government better,
RecallSamAdams.com
Jasun Wurster
Calm down, everyone, take a deep breath, look into Kroger’s eyes on his photo where he’s facing the camera, and ask the question…why would a man with exceptional capabilities and experience bringing down the MAFIA, handle things this way?
Because there are some very interesting things happening, regarding the news cycle, prologing the public’s attention span, and stoking the energies of people who have had ENOUGH of this.
He could not have done a better job of weakening Adams than to bring home the messages, more or less simultaneously, that
1)he couldn’t prosecute because of Breedlove’s inconsistencies, and
2)Sam is so beyond unpalatable (and continuing to force a gigantic surreal farce of epic proportions down our throats, and well, Portlanders, you voted for him, go have at recalling him.)
Interesting….so you’re saying he committed the great self sacrifice for lil’ ol’ us?
KAMIKAZE Kroger, he shall now be know as.
[...] it gets even more unusual. Yesterday Kroger circulated to the media and blogosphere multiple drafts of his investigation report. And the drafts are far more damning of the mayor than [...]
[...] light of the new information from the documents dumps that have now followed Kroger’s Monday press conference, we’re happy to take questions [...]
Gonetorio, couldn’t Kroger have submitted any one of his staff’s earlier drafts and even achieved more “stoking the energies”, if your theory holds any water? The earlier drafts hold more water and interesting substance than the present. He could still conclude not to prosecute and let the voters have their say and hopefully recall.
How an investigation is dispensed to the public is just as critical as the substance. Most times having more of the enchilada early with the headlines furthers the desired affect than dribbling.
I’m waiting for the day when just a few of our elected officials start doing the right thing (even in their own minds) and forget the jockyin’ for political gain or protection that I suspect in Kroger’s revisions.
Somehow tw, I don’t see KamaKazi Kroger getting much political gain from this.
Maybe he’s got SAD. He’s only been out here what, like 6 or 7 years? Got to be the weather. I’ve heard stories how the 45 days straight and counting of rain and dark skies, can make a DA go bats!
Personally speaking, I think the AG needs to be investigated. This isn’t the first time he has “watered” down documents. Isn’t this tampering? Fraud? Lying to the public? Why is nothing being done to this fool that is supposed to represent our best interests. At this point, our best interest is that this moron resign.
Our mayor is a slimeball. His lawyers are expected to be slimeballs, so that’s no surprise.
Whatever the AG report found, we shouldn’t have to be dealing with any of this, because he shouldn’t have been so reckless in the first place.
It all started with Vera Katz, she brought “the big city” to P-town. Big city developers, big city money, big city attitudes, big city politics, and now big city corruption. People seem to have forgotten that Vera “mentored” Sam into the fine, upstanding politician he has become. In my opinion, this town began to betray it’s progressive vision begining with her office.
It all started with Vera Katz, she brought “the big city” to P-town. Big city developers, big city money, big city attitudes, big city politics, and now big city corruption. People seem to have forgotten that Vera “mentored” Sam into the fine, upstanding politician he has become. In my opinion, this town began to betray it’s progressive vision begining with her office.
YEAH,,,And you wonder why I tried to recall her…DEAD ON POST!
A BIG PS: I also said, if we didn’t recall her, what would happen..NO JOY IN …I told you so.
DO NOT FAIL THE RECALL!
lw,
I think Kroger needed to make the end product unambiguously support his decision not to prosecute, in light of the he-said-he-said problem and no witnesses, etc.
The public does need SOME spoonfeeding, and what better way to bring the message home to them that
a)our system is BS (final report)
and
b)our system is REALLY BS (series of earlier drafts)
and
c)the only way to get rid of this lowlife is to recall him.
Easy, get your pens out.