AG Bruning denies meeting with Gov. Heineman on illegal prisoner program; calls subpoena political theater

Oct. 17, 2014, 5:22 a.m. ·

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Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning is denying he and Gov. Dave Heineman met to discuss an allegedly illegal program allowing former prison inmates released too early to remain at home. And Bruning says an upcoming hearing at which the governor has been subpoenaed to appear is political theater.

One key point in the Legislature’s prison investigation involves a meeting Gov. Heineman and Attorney General Bruning allegedly attended. The allegation comes from notes written by George Green, former chief counsel for the Department of Correctional Services.

Green retired in August after admitting he waited 16 months to read a Nebraska Supreme Court decision that said prisoners were being released too early. But before he retired, he met with Corrections Director Mike Kenney. Green told Kenney the so-called Temporary Alternative Placement program, or T.A.P. program allowing some former inmates mistakenly released early to remain in their homes was illegal. Green’s notes say when he said that, Director Kenney told him Heineman and Bruning were in the room when decisions about the T.A.P. program were made. In an interview with NET News Friday, Bruning said that never happened. “There were never discussions about the T.A.P. Mike Kenney said in his testimony he created it. He said ‘I created it.’ He didn’t ask me about it and he didn’t ask the governor about it,” Bruning said.

The committee, in a move apparently without precedent in Nebraska history, has subpoenaed the governor to testify before it in a hearing Oct. 29. Bruning, a Republican like Heineman, said politics is behind the hearing. “That happens to be the week before the election. Do you think that’s coincidence?” he asked, laughing. “This whole issue has been over-politicized. There didn’t need to be a subpoena. The hearing doesn’t need to be the week before the election. I mean, this is all Kabuki theater designed for electoral gain.”

Committee chairman Sen. Steve Lathrop of Omaha is a registered Democrat in the officially nonpartisan Legislature. He was joined by two other Democrats, three Republicans, and one independent in voting unanimously to subpoena the governor. Lathrop declined to respond directly to Bruning’s comments, saying the committee is “engaged in a serious process of searching for the truth.”

“I have no response to these kinds of assertions or press conferences other than to express that the committee looks forward to the governor’s testimony on Oct. 29, which is testimony that he’s indicated he’s anxious to provide,” Lathrop added.