Gov. Tom Corbett has asked for records of interoffice emails containing pornography that were apparently exchanged among former employees of the state attorney general's office, including two men who are now his top aides.
The Thursday night letter from Corbett's top human resources officer, Secretary of Administration Kelly Powell Logan, was sent hours after Attorney General Kathleen Kane's office identified the eight ex-employees and disclosed contents of the emails.
Kane is a Democrat who took office last year. The men all worked under Corbett, a Republican, when he was the attorney general.
Most of them went on to work for him as governor. In the request, Logan asked Kane for the contents of the emails and details about the email chain, including the dates, times and recipients. Logan also sought details about whether and when the email was opened or deleted.
In a statement after Kane released the information, Corbett said the pornographic material, as described by media outlets, was inappropriate and should not be tolerated in the workplace.
A spokeswoman said Friday that Kane's office had received the letter but had no immediate response. Kane's office has already said that it cannot determine whether the men opened the emails they received.
Hundreds of pornographic emails sent from 2008 to 2012 were discovered during Kane's review of the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse prosecution, her office said.
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Among the ex-employees identified by Kane's office as recipients of the emails are two top state officials: Environmental Protection Secretary Christopher Abruzzo and State Police Commissioner Frank Noonan.
Noonan is in the midst of directing a massive manhunt for a survivalist accused of the Sept. 12 fatal ambush of a trooper at a state police barracks in northeastern Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains.
Noonan received 338 pornographic emails and sent none, and Abruzzo received 46 and sent eight, Kane's office said. Noonan was the office's chief of criminal investigations, and Abruzzo formerly supervised the attorney general's drug strike force section.
Most of the men identified by Kane's office have stayed silent.
One of them, Randy Feathers, a former agent who Corbett appointed to the Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole, said in a statement through the board that the images shown to reporters were not a reflection of my professional behavior and I don't condone this activity.''
Kane has defended her decision to release the names as being in the public's best interest to understand how its public servants conduct business. Being transparent on the matter is a good way to help stop the practice on state-owned equipment during official work hours, she said in a statement.
