W.A. Clark Memorial Library

Huguette Clark's estate will now be managed by a public official, not her attorney and accountant. Still to be determined: Which of her documented wills should the court honor?

NEW YORK — Based on "shocking" evidence of tax fraud, a judge on Friday suspended the attorney and accountant for reclusive copper heiress Huguette Clark from handling her $400 million estate.

The judge said there was more than enough evidence that the two men engaged in a tax fraud that allowed the elderly woman to run up an IRS bill of $90 million in unpaid gift taxes, interest and potential penalties.

The decision costs each man about $8 million he would have earned as an executor.

Also Friday, a remaining executor of the estate said he will try to recover at least one of the gifts given from Clark's accounts in recent years, a $5 million check written by Clark's attorney to Clark's registered nurse, Hadassah Peri. Clark's attorney had no authority to make that gift, the executor alleged. The $5 million was part of about $26 million given to the nurse over the past 15 years, even before Clark left more than $30 million to Peri in her will.

In Surrogate's Court in Manhattan, Surrogate Kristin Booth Glen took away the powers of Clark's attorney, Wallace "Wally" Bock, and accountant, Irving Kamsler. The two men remain under criminal investigation by the Manhattan district attorney for the way they managed her estate. They have not been charged with any crime and have said they acted appropriately.

The judge only suspended the men's privileges in handling her estate, instead of revoking them permanently, because their attorneys said a conflict of interest has arisen, apparently indicating that the two men are starting to tell different stories about the handling of Clark's affairs over the past 15 years. Until that is sorted out, attorney Barry Vasios said, the attorneys couldn't file an answer to the claim of tax fraud.

Even without hearing from the two men, the judge said she couldn't imagine how they could refute the claim that they are "unfit to serve" for wasting money from the estate, violating rules of conduct, dealing dishonestly with authorities and violating their fiduciary duty. She called the allegations shocking and suspended them immediately. If they want back into the case, she said, they can file a petition. And she said the two men may have to pay some of their own attorney fees, instead of having them paid by the estate, if their delay or dishonesty ran up the legal bills.

The estate will now be managed entirely by attorneys for the public administrator, who earlier this week alleged the tax fraud. Details on the allegations are in our earlier story: Tax fraud alleged in estate of heiress Huguette Clark; accountant resigns. Earlier this week, the accountant, Kamsler, told the court through an attorney that he planned to resign as an executor. He had not yet resigned by the time of Friday's hearing, however.

An attorney for the public administrator, Peter Schram, said an expert in legal ethics "could tell you how many ethical considerations and disciplinary rules Mr. Bock has violated. My guess is you'd need two hands and a couple of toes to count them."

Huguette Clark, daughter of William A. Clark, who was a senator from Montana and a copper magnate.

The judge also ruled on a second question, whether to allow Clark's relatives, descendants from her father's first marriage, to become parties to the case during the accounting of the estate. The judge blocked the family from entering the case now, saying that the interests of the estate are being well looked after by the public administrator, who was appointed at first as a third temporary executor to watch over Bock and Kamsler. This ruling will not keep the family from entering the case later. The family's entry was opposed by Clark's nurse, Peri.

Clark, who died in May at age 104, gained public attention in a series of articles on msnbc.com over the past two years, focusing at first on the mystery of her empty mansions and then the financial dealings of her attorney and accountant. The full series of articles is at http://clark.msnbc.com. Born in 1906, Clark was the youngest child of former U.S. Sen. William Andrews Clark (1839-1925), a copper miner and U.S. senator from Montana, said to be one of the richest men in the world. Below are links to the full story.

A dozen lawyers stood before Judge Glen on Friday morning in the courtroom in lower Manhattan, less than a mile from the office where Clark's father managed his mines, railroads and other properties until his death in 1925. Huguette, born in Paris in 1906, was his youngest daughter.

Clark signed two wills, in 2005, at age 98. The first left $5 million to the nurse, and the rest to the relatives. The second, signed just six weeks later, left nothing to the family, more than $30 million to the nurse, about $12 million to a goddaughter, $500,000 each to her attorney and accountant, $1 million to Beth Israel Hospital in New York City, $100,000 to her physician, a Monet painting worth about $25 million to the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington. It also set up a charitable foundation to run an art museum at her oceanfront estate in Santa Barbara, Calif., to be controlled by her attorney and accountant. Her apartments on Fifth Avenue in New York City and her country home in Connecticut would presumably be liquidated.

The public administrator alleges that while Clark lived as a recluse in New York City hospital rooms for the last 20 years of her life, attorney Bock and accountant Kamsler:

• Failed to file federal gift tax returns for Clark for the years 1997 through 2003, when she made approximately $56 million in gifts to individuals. The gift tax and generation-skipping transfer (GST) tax due would have been about $41.5 million.
• Charged her for filing tax returns that were not filed.
• Paid only $7.5 million in estimated tax payments toward the gift tax in those years.
• Failed to pay the remaining $34 million during the years since, exposing her to millions in IRS interest and penalties for failure to file.
• Failed to tell Clark about the unpaid taxes or possible interest and penalties, even though she had sufficient liquid assets to pay the bill in full.
• Filed false returns with the IRS for the years 2004 through 2009, claiming that previous gift tax returns had been filed, and understating Clark's current tax liabilities by more than $7 million.
• Underreported and underpaid by millions her federal taxes.
• Misrepresented to the IRS that returns had been filed.
• Lied to the IRS, with Kamsler claiming he was unaware of a $5 million gift to Clark's nurse, when documents show he listed that gift on a profit and loss statement seven months earlier.
• Lied to the public administrator, claiming that they were searching for the gift tax returns, until the IRS disclosed that none had been filed.

The new allegations raise the possibility that the men could face federal charges, with the public administrator noting that it is a felony to willfully submit fraudulent tax returns.

The accountant, Kamsler, 64, from the Bronx, N.Y., is a convicted felon and a registered sex offender who pleaded guilty in 2008 to attempting to distribute indecent materials to teenage girls in a chat room on AOL, under the moniker "IRV1040." The court granted Kamsler a "relief from civil disabilities," a document that allowed him to keep his state license as a certified public accountant. The attorney, Bock, 79, is from Queens, N.Y.

Msnbc.com reported last year that the two men also handled the affairs of another elderly client, Donald Wallace, who in fact was the previous attorney for Huguette Clark. After the man's will was revised six times, during years when his relatives said he was suffering from dementia, Bock and Kamsler ended up as his executors and also beneficiaries in his will, getting his New York apartment and his Mercedes.

An attorney representing Bock and Kamsler in the estate case, John Dadakis of the firm of Holland and Knight, issued this statement Wednesday through a spokesman: "For 30 years, Irving Kamsler was Mrs. Clark's accountant, and for 15 years Wallace Bock was her attorney. There is no allegation in the papers filed that either individual was taking anything out of her account for themselves. Their entire handling of her affairs was an effort to protect and preserve Mrs. Clark's chosen lifestyle."

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Documents (PDF files)

Family reply to nurse Peri and Bock and Kamsler, Dec. 21, 2011

Public administrator's petition to remove Bock and Kamsler, Dec. 20, 2011

Bock and Kamsler reply to the family's motion to intervene, Dec. 16, 2011

Nurse Peri's motion opposing the family entering the case, Dec. 7, 2011

Family motion to intervene in the estate case, Nov. 28, 2011

Huguette Clark's last will and testament, signed April 19, 2005

Huguette Clark's previous will, signed March 7, 2005

Family's petition seeking a guardian for Huguette Clark, September 2010

Attorney Bock's sworn statement to the court, September 2010

Judge's ruling rejecting her family's guardianship petition, September 2010

Kamsler letter informing Clark of his guilty plea, February 2009

Kamsler's criminal court file and investigator's report

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Previous stories in the Huguette Clark mystery on msnbc.com:

Archive of all stories, photos and videos

Photo narrative, "The Clarks: An American story of wealth, scandal and mystery," Feb. 26, 2010.

Printable version of the photo narrative, Feb. 26, 2010. 

Clark family notes and sources, Feb. 26, 2010.

Investigative report, part one, "At 104, the mysterious heiress Huguette Clark is alone now: Relatives are kept away. Only her accountant and attorney visit. Who protects HuguetteClark, with 3 empty homes and no heirs?" Aug. 19, 2010.

Investigative report, part two, "Who is watching Huguette Clark's millions? Reclusive heiress's assets are sold by two advisers, one an accountant with a felony conviction. Another elderly client signed over his property to the same accountant and attorney," Aug. 20, 2010. 

"Criminal probe begins into the finances of reclusive heiress Huguette Clark: Manhattan DA's Elder Abuse Unit is on the case. The same unit prosecuted the Brooke Astor case — though Clark has about four times the wealth," Aug. 24, 2010. 

"Report sparks welfare check on heiress Huguette Clark," Aug. 25, 2010. 

"Generosity of an heiress: four homes for a nurse, gifts for attorney's family," Sept. 1, 2010. 

"Huguette Clark, the reclusive heiress, has signed a will, attorney says," Sept. 2, 2010.

"Family of copper heiress asks court to protect her from attorney, accountant," Sept. 3, 2010.

"Attorney for 104-year-old heiress defends his handling of her finances," Sept. 7, 2010. 

"Judge leaves pair under investigation in control of heiress Huguette Clark's fortune," Sept. 9, 2010. 

"Huguette Clark, the reclusive copper heiress, dies at 104," May 24, 2011.

"Family excluded from Huguette Clark burial," May 26, 2011.

"Heiress Huguette Clark's will leaves $1 million to advisers," June 22, 2011.

"The 1 percent of the 1 percent: How Huguette Clark's millions were spent," Nov. 19, 2011.

"A $400 miillion twist: Huguette Clark signed two wills, one to her family," Nov. 28, 2011.

"Tax fraud alleged in estate of heiress Huguette Clark; accountant resigns," Dec. 21, 2011.

"Nurse, in line to inherit millions, battles family of heiress Huguette Clark," Dec. 22, 2011.

W.A. Clark Memorial Library

Huguette Clark with one of her prized dolls. She reached age 98 without declaring who should receive her copper-mining fortune, and then signed two contradictory wills back to back. The latest will leaves much of her money, and her dolls, to her longtime nurse.

NEW YORK — The longtime private registered nurse for heiress Huguette Clark, named to receive more than $30 million in her last will and testament, will be fighting in court on Friday to keep Clark's relatives from poking into the way Clark's money was spent.

The nurse, Hadassah Peri, an immigrant from the Philippines, already owns a $200,000 Bentley Arnage luxury sedan and five houses. Money for four of those houses was given to her through the years by Clark, whom she joined almost 20 years ago when assigned by a home care agency.

The total amount of money already given to Peri was about $26 million, according to court documents, even before the amounts left in the will. That's a far higher figure than previously disclosed. The reclusive Clark, heir to a share of one of America's largest mining fortunes from the 19th century, lived out her last decades in modest hospital rooms in New York City before dying in May at age 104.

Nineteen of Clark's relatives have asked the court to make them a party to the first stage of the legal battle, the accounting for Clark's $400 million fortune. It's presumed that this step will lead to the family contesting Clark's last will, which leaves nothing to family. The family has filed in court a previous will, signed just six weeks before the last one. That earlier document left nearly everything to the family, and only $5 million to the nurse.

Read the related story: Tax fraud alleged in estate of heiress; accountant resigns.

On Friday the parties will argue in front of the judge in Surrogate's Court in Manhattan, Surrogate Kristin Booth Glen.

Also on the judge's plate: whether or not Clark's longtime attorney should remain as an executor of her estate. That issue took the spotlight this week, as Clark's accountant resigned as an executor, just before a public official investigating Clark's finances accused the attorney and executive of fraud in handling Clark's taxes. The attorney and accountant, also the subject of an investigation by the Manhattan district attorney, have said they handled Clark's finances appropriately and according to her wishes.

See the related story: Tax fraud alleged in estate of heiress Huguette Clark; accountant resigns.

Speaking for nurse Peri, attorney Harvey E. Corn argued in court documents on Dec. 7 that Clark gave the money, and her doll collection, to her out of "gratitude for Ms. Peri's devoted service." Corn says that "Ms. Peri saw or communicated with the Decedent almost every day" during her nearly 20 years of service. And he says that hospital records from the six months around the signing of the wills show that Clark was in good health, "conversant, cheerful, well read and engaged in taking care of her personal affairs." Corn argues that the family has no legal standing, and that their intervention will cause delay and wasting of the estate in additional legal fees.

The family attorney, John R. Morken, replied in court papers on Wednesday. He said family members were not so distant as they have been portrayed, and had shown concern for Clark while she was alive. Family members have said their contacts with Clark were abruptly cut off by her attorney around the same time the wills were written, in 2005, when she was 98 years old. Then, in 2010 after msnbc.com disclosed questions about the financial dealings of Clark's attorney and accountant, three family members asked a court to appoint a guardian for her. That request was denied without even a hearing in court.

"The litigation in this Estate is not just about the probate of a will," Morken argued. "Rather, it is about what transpired during the last twenty years of Huguette Clark's life. This inquiry requires an open airing of the facts. The Family Members should not be denied the opportunity to participate in same. They were denied that opportunity when their Guardianship Petition was dismissed in 2010, while Huguette was alive. They should not be denied that opportunity again." Several times in the document, Morken suggests that Peri enabled or cooperated with the attorney and accountant in getting Clark to sign a second will that benefitted them all.

Hadassah Peri has not spoken publicly about Clark, but a press agent issued a statement on her behalf in June after she was named in the will: "I saw Madame Clark virtually every day for the 20 years. I was her private duty nurse but also her close friend. I knew her as a kind and generous person, with whom I shared many wonderful moments and whom I loved very much. I am profoundly sad at her passing, awed at the generosity she has shown me and my family, and eternally grateful. Just as Madame Clark demonstrated kindness toward others in her actions, so, too, will I and my family devote a substantial portion of this bequest toward making the world a better place for all people."

The public official investigating Clark's finances, the New York County public administrator's office, has already said in court papers that it might seek to "claw back" into the estate some of the gifts given from Clark's accounts while she lived. The administrator said the powers of attorney that Clark signed over to her attorney and accountant did not include the authority to give gifts, including a $5 million check written to Peri in 2009, after Clark herself stopped writing checks on her account. 

If that clawback effort is successful, and if the second will is thrown out, Peri could not only lose the large bequest but could also have to pay back some of what she now has. Morken calls that Peri's "day of reckoning."

See below the full documents from the nurse, the family, and the attorney and accountant.

Though she inherited one of the great mining fortunes of the 19th century, Huguette (pronounced "hue-GET") Marcelle Clark lived quietly into the 21st century, secluded under fake names in a hospital room for more than two decades despite being in relatively good physical health. Intensely shy, she was almost entirely alone, aside from her private nurse, other helpers and occasional visits by her accountant. One of her former attorneys represented her for 20 years without meeting her face to face, instead talking to her through a closed door.

In the last year of her life, after her three empty mansions drew the attention of a reporter for msnbc.com in late 2009, she became a subject of public fascination, a trending topic of searches on Google and Yahoo, pictured on the cover of the New York tabloids, with fan pages on Facebook, a biography on Wikipedia, and her story read by tens of millions — though the last known photograph of her was made in 1930.

Huguette Clark was married only briefly and had no children. Her only full sister died at age 16 and had no children. Her mother had no other children. Under state law that leaves 21 "intestate distributees" — the relatives who would inherit her estate if she left no will or if the court chooses to uphold the earlier will instead of the later one. Nineteen of the 21 are in court now. Those 21 relatives are descended from three of the children from Sen. Clark's first marriage: 13 half-grandnieces and half-grandnephews (and their children), and eight half-great-grandnieces and half-great-grandnephews (and their children). Counting all the children of these relatives, there are about 50 living descendants of Clark's father.

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Documents (PDF files)

Family reply to nurse Peri and Bock and Kamsler, Dec. 21, 2011

Public administrator's petition to remove Bock and Kamsler, Dec. 20, 2011

Bock and Kamsler reply to the family's motion to intervene, Dec. 16, 2011

Nurse Peri's motion opposing the family entering the case, Dec. 7, 2011

Family motion to intervene in the estate case, Nov. 28, 2011

Huguette Clark's last will and testament, signed April 19, 2005

Huguette Clark's previous will, signed March 7, 2005

Family's petition seeking a guardian for Huguette Clark, September 2010

Attorney Bock's sworn statement to the court, September 2010

Judge's ruling rejecting her family's guardianship petition, September 2010

Kamsler letter informing Clark of his guilty plea, February 2009

Kamsler's criminal court file and investigator's report

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Previous stories in the Huguette Clark mystery on msnbc.com:

Archive of all stories, photos and videos

Photo narrative, "The Clarks: An American story of wealth, scandal and mystery," Feb. 26, 2010.

Printable version of the photo narrative, Feb. 26, 2010. 

Clark family notes and sources, Feb. 26, 2010.

Investigative report, part one, "At 104, the mysterious heiress Huguette Clark is alone now: Relatives are kept away. Only her accountant and attorney visit. Who protects HuguetteClark, with 3 empty homes and no heirs?" Aug. 19, 2010.

Investigative report, part two, "Who is watching Huguette Clark's millions? Reclusive heiress's assets are sold by two advisers, one an accountant with a felony conviction. Another elderly client signed over his property to the same accountant and attorney," Aug. 20, 2010. 

"Criminal probe begins into the finances of reclusive heiress Huguette Clark: Manhattan DA's Elder Abuse Unit is on the case. The same unit prosecuted the Brooke Astor case — though Clark has about four times the wealth," Aug. 24, 2010. 

"Report sparks welfare check on heiress Huguette Clark," Aug. 25, 2010. 

"Generosity of an heiress: four homes for a nurse, gifts for attorney's family," Sept. 1, 2010. 

"Huguette Clark, the reclusive heiress, has signed a will, attorney says," Sept. 2, 2010.

"Family of copper heiress asks court to protect her from attorney, accountant," Sept. 3, 2010.

"Attorney for 104-year-old heiress defends his handling of her finances," Sept. 7, 2010. 

"Judge leaves pair under investigation in control of heiress Huguette Clark's fortune," Sept. 9, 2010. 

"Huguette Clark, the reclusive copper heiress, dies at 104," May 24, 2011.

"Family excluded from Huguette Clark burial," May 26, 2011.

"Heiress Huguette Clark's will leaves $1 million to advisers," June 22, 2011.

"The 1 percent of the 1 percent: How Huguette Clark's millions were spent," Nov. 19, 2011.

"A $400 miillion twist: Huguette Clark signed two wills, one to her family," Nov. 28, 2011.

"Tax fraud alleged in estate of heiress Huguette Clark; accountant resigns," Dec. 21, 2011.

Associated Press

This is the last known photo of Huguette Clark, taken 80 years ago. She hid away in a New York hospital room for at least the past 22 years, until her death in May. This photo was made on Aug. 11, 1930, the day of her divorce, in Reno, Nev. Her marriage lasted two years. She had no children.

New York — A New York official has accused the attorney and accountant for mysterious heiress Huguette Clark of a tax fraud that could cost her estate $50 million in IRS penalties. While the men denied any wrongdoing, the accountant resigned this week from handling her $400 million estate just before the allegations were leveled in court documents.

The allegation was made by the office of the public administrator of New York County, who was appointed by the court as a third executor, in effect to watch the actions of Clark's attorney and accountant. The public administrator, Ethel J. Griffin, asked the court on Tuesday to remove attorney Wallace "Wally" Bock and accountant Irving Kamsler as executors, a position that would normally pay each of them about 2 percent of her estate, or roughly $8 million each.

Read the related story: Nurse, in line to inherit millions, battles family of heiress Huguette Clark.

Document: Read the full petition at msnbc.com. (PDF file opens in a new window.)

Clark, who died in May at age 104, gained public attention in a series of articles on msnbc.com over the past two years, focusing at first on the mystery of her empty mansions and then the financial dealings of her attorney and accountant. The full series of articles is at http://clark.msnbc.com. Born in 1906, Clark was the youngest child of former U.S. Sen. William Andrews Clark (1839-1925), a copper miner and U.S. senator from Montana, said to be one of the richest men in the world.

The public administrator alleges that while Huguette Clark lived as a recluse in New York City hospital rooms, attorney Bock and accountant Kamsler:

• Failed to file federal gift tax returns for Clark for the years 1997 through 2003, when she made approximately $56 million in gifts to individuals. The gift tax and generation-skipping transfer (GST) tax due would have been about $41.5 million.
• Charged her for filing tax returns that were not filed.
• Paid only $7.5 million in estimated tax payments toward the gift tax in those years.
• Failed to pay the remaining $34 million during the years since, exposing her to millions in IRS interest and penalties for failure to file.
• Failed to tell Clark about the unpaid taxes or possible interest and penalties, even though she had sufficient liquid assets to pay the bill in full.
• Filed false returns with the IRS for the years 2004 through 2009, claiming that previous gift tax returns had been filed, and understating Clark's current tax liabilities by more than $7 million.
• Underreported and underpaid by millions her federal taxes.
• Misrepresented to the IRS that returns had been filed.
• Lied to the IRS, with Kamsler claiming he was unaware of a $5 million gift to Clark's nurse, when documents show he listed that gift on a profit and loss statement seven months earlier.
• Lied to the public administrator, claiming that they were searching for the gift tax returns, until the IRS disclosed that none had been filed.

"By 2011, Mrs. Clark owed $34,000,000 in gift and GST taxes for the years 1997 through 2003; plus potential late filing and late payment penalties in excess of $16,000,000; plus interest on the unpaid taxes and potential penalties in the amount of approximately $32,000,000; for a total liability to the IRS in excess of $82,000,000," the public administrator alleges, adding that "neither Bock nor Kamsler made Mrs. Clark aware of this tax liability."

Claudio Papapietro

Irving Kamsler, Huguette Clark's longtime accountant, resigned as her executor this week. He is shown outside court on Long Island after he pleaded guilty in October 2008 to attempting to disseminate indecent material to minors on AOL. The court sentenced him to five years of probation, but he was allowed to keep his license as a certified public accountant. In a letter he told his client only the barest details of the case.

The tax bill was rising at the rate of $9,000 per day, the public administrator calculated.

"Bock and Kamsler have demonstrated," the public administrator wrote, "that they are unfit for the execution of their office as Preliminary Executors, by reason of their dishonesty, improvidence, waste and want of understanding, both while Mrs. Clark was alive and subequent to their appointment." In addition, the public administrator's office said it is investigating what it believes are other violations of trust, including improper solicitation of gifts, abuse of powers of attorney, and making gifts without authority. The case is being handled by attorneys for the public administrator, including Peter Schram, David R. Gelfand and Georgiana J. Slade.

An attorney for Kamsler in the estate case wrote to the judge informing her that Kamsler would resign. That letter was filed in court on Tuesday, just ahead of the filing by the public administrator, and was released by the court on Wednesday.

Kamsler's criminal defense attorney, Elizabeth Crotty, would not answer questions but issued a statement on Wednesday: "For the past 3 decades, Mr. Kamsler has served professionally and diligently as Ms. Clark's accountant. Although Mr. Kamsler is fully capable of remaining as a preliminary executor to Ms. Clark's estate, the distant family members and the Public Administrator have made it impossible for him to carry out her wishes. Therefore, Mr. Kamsler is voluntarily removing himself as Preliminary Executor, with the hope that Ms. Clark's last wishes be respected and to put this whole matter behind him."

An attorney representing Bock and Kamsler in the estate case, John Dadakis of the firm of Holland and Knight, issued this statement Wednesday through a spokesman: "For 30 years, Irving Kamsler was Mrs. Clark's accountant, and for 15 years Wallace Bock was her attorney. There is no allegation in the paper's filed that either individual was taking anything out of her account for themselves. Their entire handling of her affairs was an effort to protect and preserve Mrs. Clark's chosen lifestyle."

Bock and Kamsler are already under investigation by the Manhattan district attorney, who is looking into their handling of Clark's finances; no charges have been filed, and the investigation remains open.

Christopher Sadowski

Attorney Wallace "Wally" Bock says he has always done exactly what his client, heiress Huguette Clark, has asked. He acknowledged soliciting from her a gift of $1.5 million for the community where his daughter and grandchildren live. Court records show the amount to be $1.85 million. He remains an executor of her estate, at least until a court hearing planned for Friday.

The new allegations raise the possibility that they could face federal charges, with the public administrator noting that it is a felony to willfully submit fraudulent tax returns.

Kamsler, 64, from the Bronx, N.Y., is a convicted felon and a registered sex offender who pleaded guilty in 2008 to attempting to distribute indecent materials to teenage girls in a chat room on AOL, under the moniker "IRV1040." Bock, 79, is from Queens, N.Y.

Msnbc.com reported last year that the two men also handled the affairs of another elderly client, Donald Wallace, who in fact was the previous attorney for Huguette Clark. After the man's will was revised six times, during years when his relatives said he was suffering from dementia, Bock and Kamsler ended up as his executors and also beneficiaries in his will, getting his New York apartment and his Mercedes.

And the allegations may bolster the request by Clark's relatives that they be allowed to intervene in the case. The relatives disclosed last month that Clark signed two wills at age 98 in 2005, six weeks apart: The first benefitted mostly her family, the second cut out the family altogether and included $500,000 each in bequests to attorney Bock and accountant Kamsler, who also stood to benefit as trustees of a charitable foundation and art museum to be established in her home in Santa Barbara, Calif. The family has not yet officially challenged that second will but has asked to intervene in a preliminary stage of the case, the accounting of the estate.

The public administrator makes a point in the document of saying that the gifts made by Bock and Kamsler from Clark's accounts may not have been valid, because the men may not have had authority to make those gifts. "The Public Administrator will seek, in a separate proceeding, to clawback into the Estate any gifts deemed to be invalid."

The public administrator notes that Kamsler lists himself in online biographies as a specialist in "gift tax planning and preparation," and Bock bills himself as having "substantial expertise in estate planning."

The allegations by the public administrator were first reported Wednesday by The Associated Press.

A hearing is scheduled on Friday in Surrogate's Court in Manhattan on the family's request to intervene in the case, and the public administrator's request to remove Bock and Kamsler.

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Documents (PDF files)

Family reply to nurse and attorney and accountant, Dec. 21, 2011

Public administrator's petition to remove attorney and accountant, Dec. 20, 2011

Public administrator's petition to remove Bock and Kamsler, Dec. 20, 2011

Bock and Kamsler reply to the family's motion to intervene, Dec. 16, 2011

Family motion to intervene in the estate case, Nov. 28, 2011

Huguette Clark's last will and testament, signed April 19, 2005

Huguette Clark's previous will, signed March 7, 2005

Family's petition seeking a guardian for Huguette Clark, September 2010

Attorney Bock's sworn statement to the court, September 2010

Judge's ruling rejecting her family's guardianship petition, September 2010

Kamsler letter informing Clark of his guilty plea, February 2009

Kamsler's criminal court file and investigator's report

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Stories in the Huguette Clark mystery on msnbc.com:

Archive of all stories, photos and videos

Photo narrative, "The Clarks: An American story of wealth, scandal and mystery," Feb. 26, 2010.

Printable version of the photo narrative, Feb. 26, 2010. 

Clark family notes and sources, Feb. 26, 2010.

Investigative report, part one, "At 104, the mysterious heiress Huguette Clark is alone now: Relatives are kept away. Only her accountant and attorney visit. Who protects Huguette Clark, with 3 empty homes and no heirs?" Aug. 19, 2010.

Investigative report, part two, "Who is watching Huguette Clark's millions? Reclusive heiress's assets are sold by two advisers, one an accountant with a felony conviction. Another elderly client signed over his property to the same accountant and attorney," Aug. 20, 2010. 

"Criminal probe begins into the finances of reclusive heiress Huguette Clark: Manhattan DA's Elder Abuse Unit is on the case. The same unit prosecuted the Brooke Astor case — though Clark has about four times the wealth," Aug. 24, 2010. 

"Report sparks welfare check on heiress Huguette Clark," Aug. 25, 2010. 

"Generosity of an heiress: four homes for a nurse, gifts for attorney's family," Sept. 1, 2010. 

"Huguette Clark, the reclusive heiress, has signed a will, attorney says," Sept. 2, 2010.

"Family of copper heiress asks court to protect her from attorney, accountant," Sept. 3, 2010.

"Attorney for 104-year-old heiress defends his handling of her finances," Sept. 7, 2010. 

"Judge leaves pair under investigation in control of heiress Huguette Clark's fortune," Sept. 9, 2010. 

"Huguette Clark, the reclusive copper heiress, dies at 104," May 24, 2011.

"Family excluded from Huguette Clark burial," May 26, 2011.

"Heiress Huguette Clark's will leaves $1 million to advisers," June 22, 2011.

"The 1 percent of the 1 percent: How Huguette Clark's millions were spent," Nov. 19, 2011.

"A $400 miillion twist: Huguette Clark signed two wills, one to her family," Nov. 28, 2011.

"Nurse, in line to inherit millions, battles family of heiress Huguette Clark," Dec. 22, 2011.

Joshua Roberts / Reuters

Army Pfc. Bradley Manning leaves U.S. Magistrate Court at Fort Meade, Md., on Tuesday.

Raising the hackles of some attorneys who work on transgender legal issues, defense attorneys for Bradley Manning apparently intend to make an almost novel legal argument -- that the Army private was suffering from gender identity disorder when his alleged crimes were committed -- if his case proceeds to court martial as expected.

In the first five days of Manning’s preliminary hearing at Fort Meade, Md., prosecutors and defense attorneys have both presented evidence that Manning, accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of secret government documents to the WikiLeaks website, was wrestling with gender issues in the period leading up to the publication of the documents.

The defense stated Saturday that Manning, 24, had written to one of his supervisors when he was stationed in Iraq before his arrest and said he had concluded he was suffering from gender identity disorder, which is classified as a medical disorder in the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems. He included a photo of himself dressed as a woman in the letter and said the issue was affecting his ability to do his job or think clearly.

A defense attorney and a witness also stated that Manning had created a Facebook profile and opened at least one email account using the name “Breanna Manning,” which the attorney described as an “alter-ego.”

As the hearing continued Tuesday, prosecutors presented testimony indicating that Manning had used another soldier’s laptop to order a book on female facial reconstructive surgery from Amazon.com that he had shipped to his Potomac address.

A search of Amazon.com for the term “female facial reconstructive surgery” returns just one title, “Facial Feminization Surgery: A Guide for the Transgendered Woman.”

Also Tuesday, Manning’s attorneys did little to challenge testimony by prosecution witnesses tying Manning to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and other electronic evidence collected in the case.

Manning is charged with aiding the enemy and violating the Espionage Act. If found guilty, he could be sentenced to life in prison.

If Manning’s case does go to court martial, his attorneys will apparently be just the second defense team to attempt to use a gender identity disorder as at least a partial defense in a military case, according to Jack King, a staff attorney with the National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys specializing in mental health issues.

The only other case on record, he said, involved Karen Davis, a Navy electrician's mate, second class, formerly known as Charles Marx, who was prosecuted in the mid-1980s “for wearing women's clothing (a skirt, nylons, a women's blouse, a bra, women's fashion jeans, nail polish, a purse, and a wig) on numerous occasions while at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard.”

In appealing her court martial in 1988, Davis' attorneys argued that such conduct was not illegal. They also stated that, while living as Marx, she had been diagnosed by several Navy psychiatrists as having gender identity disorder and that cross-dressing was therapeutic.

The military appeals court allowed her dishonorable discharge to stand for the reason that cross-dressing was “prejudicial to good order and discipline and discrediting of the Armed Forces."

King said such a case would be unlikely today, given the greater understanding of gender identity disorder.

“Now, if a person could show that because he or she believed themselves to be a member of the opposite sex they had an irresistible impulse to cross-dress, they would in all likelihood qualify for a medical discharge,” he said.

Several attorneys who work with transgender legal issues said they were not aware of a gender identity disorder defense being raised in a civilian court, and King said it’s easy to see why not, noting that such a diagnosis “doesn’t prevent you from knowing right from wrong.” The disorder is most often raised in criminal proceedings as part of an overall insanity defense, or by expert witnesses arguing that a defendant is so mentally damaged that he or she should be committed, he said.

And several lawyers who work with transgender clients indicated they were not happy with the direction that the Manning proceedings have taken.

“We don’t think that being transgender, if he in fact is, has anything to do with him breaking the law,” said Kylar Broadus, an attorney with the Transgender Law and Policy Institute. “Obviously the charges are serious and we don’t want the trial to be sensationalized or detracted from by him being transgender.”

“Our opinion is there is no correlation between anything he has done and gender identity disorder,” agreed Dru Levasseur, a transgender rights attorney with Lambda Legal.

“This plays into stereotypes that are not true,” he continued. “There are a lot of people with gender identity disorder fighting for their lives to be respected and understood as human beings who need equal access to the law. This type of scenario just confuses the situation.”

Follow Mike Brunker on Facebook or Twitter.

By Myron Levin, FairWarning.org

Wind power is riding a strong breeze. In the last five years, generating capacity in the U.S. has nearly quadrupled. Clusters of tubular wind towers, rising up to 300 feet above ridgelines and gusty plains, are an increasingly familiar sight.

But in the scramble to expand clean energy and green jobs, the wind industry has fallen short on worker safety.

Thousands of the giant wind machines violate a federal requirement to give technicians who work inside the towers enough maneuvering space to get up and down their ladders safely. The standard says the space near the ladder should be free of permanent obstructions that could cause serious head or back injuries if a climber slips or is moving fast.

There are about 36,000 of the wind towers in the U.S., and more are being added all the time. Most are produced overseas to meet international codes. For reasons they won’t explain, the manufacturers either ignored the U.S. standard, or thought it wouldn’t apply to them.

The companies "evidently didn’t look into U.S. codes and standards, especially safety standards, in doing their designs," said Patrick Bell, a senior safety engineer with the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, or Cal-OSHA, and a member of a federal OSHA wind energy task force.

OSHA officials say they’re not aware of any serious injuries so far. Still, the violations are so widespread that they have flummoxed safety regulators, who are trying to figure out the extent of the hazard and what to do about it.

"We could conceivably issue citations," said Bell of Cal-OSHA, "but we might end up taking all of our compliance officers off other industries to run from one wind farm to the next."

"We are trying to work with the industry," he said, "because it’s a huge industry with all the wind towers going up."

The manufacturers have been reluctant to talk about the problem. Officials with Vestas Americas, part of Vestas Wind Systems A/S of Denmark, the world’s biggest turbine supplier, declined to be interviewed and would not respond to written questions. GE Energy, the top U.S. wind turbine maker, took the same stance. Both companies referred inquiries to the American Wind Energy Assn., a trade group.

Michele M. Mihelic, the association’s manager of labor, health and safety policy, said in an email to FairWarning that the group "cannot make a blanket statement that all wind turbines comply or not."

"Each wind turbine make and model is different," she said.

The OSHA standard dates to the 1970s, and applies to the use of fixed ladders at work sites generally, not to wind towers specifically. It requires a clearance of 30 inches from the ladder so workers can safely move up and down. If there are permanent obstructions within the climbing space, they must be shielded so workers can squeeze past without getting hurt.

The main issue with tower designs is the use of heavy steel bolts and rims known as flanges to join their long, tubular sections. In the two or three spots where the sections are fastened, the bolts and flanges intrude at least several inches into the safety space.

Two field technicians have sought to draw attention to the issue, saying they were stunned by the prevalence of the problem.

"Between my friends and I … we’ve been in thousands of wind turbines and haven’t found one that’s compliant with this issue," said Ed Oliver, 47, of Dana Point, Calif.

"We can’t believe this exists everywhere we go," said Nick Nichols, 45, of Zephyr Cove, Nev. "The regulations are there for a reason."

The men said they have seen nothing worse than bruised tailbones and minor scrapes from encounters with the flanges. But they said it’s only a matter of time before there are serious injuries. They pointed to the growing use of "climb assists" that use motors and pulleys to support part of the weight of technicians, allowing them to climb faster and basically rappel downward in the descent.

Oliver and Nichols have complained to OSHA. They also took the unusual step of offering the industry their own version of a safety device, called a deflector. The website for their company, Pinnacle Wind USA, shows what looks like a short section of a playground slide covering a flange. "Developed BY tower climbers, FOR tower climbers," it says.

Their efforts haven’t brought any love from the wind industry. In August, they were stunned by an email to Nichols from Mihelic of the wind association.

"You should…be aware that there are people posing as OSHA compliance officers and/or OSHA consultants and are threatening people in the industry with citations if they don’t buy your product," the email said.

Mihelic added that OSHA had been told about the scheme and "has requested that if any of our members are approached in this manner to please report it to them so they can investigate."

The two men immediately suspected it was a bogus claim designed to discredit them. Soon after, Nichols enlisted the help of U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., to see what OSHA knew about it.

David Michaels, assistant secretary of labor for Occupational Safety and Health, responded Oct. 11 with a letter to Heller that seemed to contradict Mihelic. OSHA officials were unaware of "any reported cases of OSHA impersonators threatening companies to purchase Pinnacle Wind USA products," the letter said.

Mihelic told FairWarning she stood by her email to Nichols.

Meanwhile, the ladder issue remains up in the air.

OSHA has not yet issued citations for violations of the standard. Brian Sturtecky, OSHA’s area director in Jacksonville, Fla., and chairman of its wind energy task force, said the agency is preparing a "letter of interpretation" to clarify how the standard will be applied

The result could be a mandate for the industry to retrofit thousands of towers. Or, the industry could get a pass if the agency decides the hazard can be controlled by other measures, such as training.

The task force is examining other safety issues in the industry in the wake of some serious accidents.

In August, 2007, a worker was killed and another injured in the collapse of a tower at a wind farm near Wasco, Ore. Also, OSHA fined Outland Energy Services $378,000 for safety violations after an employee suffered serious electrical burns at an Illinois wind farm in October, 2010.

FairWarning is a nonprofit, online investigative news organization focused on public health and safety issues.

The Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act appeared to be headed for approval one year ago - until the release of hundreds of thousands of U.S. diplomatic cables to the WikiLeaks website, allegedly by Army Pvc. Bradley Manning, thrust it to the sidelines.

Opponents of the bill seized on the incident to strip an important provision from the legislation, which ultimately died when Congress closed for Christmas without taking it up, advocates say.

EPA file

Army Specialist Bradley Manning, accused of leaking US government documents published by Wikileaks

As Manning has his first court appearance on Friday – a pretrial hearing – proponents of the legislation to protect government workers who report illegal or unethical behavior by officials have regrouped.

They are pushing a measure -- the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2011 -- winding its way through Congress, but they are encountering some familiar hold-ups. “The Manning case is certainly feeding the resistance,” said Brian, noting it was not the only factor.

Manning, who turns 24 on Saturday, is accused of using unauthorized software on government computers to pull classified information, illegally download it and send the data for public release by what the Army called the "enemy." He has been held for 18 months in confinement and his pretrial hearing at Fort Meade, Md., on Friday will be his first public appearance. He is charged with 22 counts that could land him in prison for life.

The Bradley Manning Support Network argues that the soldier is not a traitor but fits the definition of a whistleblower, citing online discussions in which he allegedly said he hoped to generate “worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms” and wanted “people to see the truth… regardless of who they are… because without information, you cannot make informed decisions as a public.”

The law firm representing Manning did not respond to an email or phone call placed seeking comment on whether they would argue this he was a whistleblower as part of his defense.

Though the new legislation pending in Congress could make some "very modest improvements,” it is still only a Band-Aid, said Stephen Kohn, executive director and co-founder of the National Whistleblowers Center, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization.

“I think that the underlying hostility to protecting national security whistleblowers pre-existed Manning … and there’s no end in sight -- meaning Congress, which excluded national (security) whistleblowers from protection in 1978 and has taken no action to fix the problem since, will continue in this current status,” he said.

Kohn said those opposed to the earlier legislation used the Manning case as a “smokescreen.”

“These folks were against it to begin with, they’ve been against it for years,” he said.

The Manning incident was bound to occur, he said, “because if someone was of conscience and did have concerns, they really have no legitimate place to go. … Under the current regime, there’s really no way to disclose these national security violations effectively and protect yourself. It does not exist.”

During the 2010 debate, Kohn’s group sent a letter to Congress with concerns that a provision in the legislation would allow “managers and political appointees to fire career civil servants who disclose violations of law.” This in turn prompted more than 90 organizations to voice their backing of the bill, The Washington Post reported.

Around the same time, the Post reported that Darrell Issa, a Republican congressman from California who had supported the bill, switched sides and argued for a delay. An Issa spokesman noted then that "new areas of concern that have been raised by the WikiLeaks" releases had convinced the congressman that the legislation should be considered in 2011.

In the first week of November, Issa and other lawmakers introduced the latest version of the legislation to the House.

"There’s really genuine interest in all three parts (White House, Senate, House of Representatives) to get something passed this spring. So I’m very hopeful actually," Brian said.

History has little to show for Americans in similar situations as Manning. In one of the most well-known cases of U.S. whistleblowing, former Marine Daniel Ellsberg in 1971 released what came to be known as the "Pentagon Papers," a secret government study put together during his time as an analyst in the Nixon Administration. The study revealed that previous administrations had deceived Congress about stepping up the Vietnam conflict. A judge eventually threw out the government's espionage and conspiracy case.

"The WikiLeaks’ unauthorised disclosures of the last year are the first in 40 years to approach the scale of the Pentagon Papers (and even surpass them in quantity and timeliness)," Ellsberg wrote in an editorial published in The Guardian, in which he called for other potential whistleblowers to not "wait until a new war has started."

Kohn did note a case that ended with positive results for whistleblowers in 1777, when 10 sailors and soldiers jumped ship and blew the whistle on the U.S. Navy commander for torturing British prisoners. The Continental Congress supported the whistleblowers, passed the country’s first whistleblower law and released all the documents -- regardless of how embarrassing they were to the United States.

“That was the first and maybe only time back in U.S. history that our government backed national security whistleblowers,” he said, chuckling. “It’s been pretty much downhill since 1777.”

Kohn also said the response to the incident showed “the founding fathers’ view of every person’s obligation to disclose misconduct was rather consistent with our view, and in fact, we believe that that is the legislative intent behind the First Amendment.”

Brian said she did not believe legislation to protect the Bradley Mannings of the world for leaking publicly classified information would ever be passed, but she hoped that his case would highlight the issue facing those in his situation. She noted that her organization and its allies were working hard to create "meaningful channels for a Bradley Manning.”

“I really believe that the lack of safe channels for disclosure is part of why people like Bradley Manning need to go straight to the public or to the media,” she said. “I’m hoping that what people learn from this is this is why we need to have a better way of handling this information,  because the government does sometimes hide their misconduct behind classification and we need to have a robust way of dealing with that.”

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Reuters / Brian Snyder

Republican presidential candidate and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney listens to a question in New Hampshire on Dec. 11. He said in an interview about the missing public records that he had no obligation to help researchers for his opponents.

It appears it was legal for Mitt Romney's aides, on their way out of the governor's office in Massachusetts in 2006, to write personal checks for $65 each to buy the hard drives from their state office computers, taking with them government emails and other records of his administration, including information about the birth of the Romney health care insurance mandate.

It was legal for the Romney administration to spend $97,000 in public money to swap out computers and email servers, making sure that emails never got into the hands of the public, journalists, historians and, not incidentally as Romney himself points out, his opponents in the 2012 presidential campaign.

And the Romney administration got legal permission, Reuters reported Thursday evening, to destroy 150 boxes of government records.

But illegality is not the only test, say advocates of open government, who wonder when the public will insist that all candidates for high office do more than give lip service to transparency.

"Public officials need an attitude adjustment," said Ken Bunting, executive director of the National Freedom of Information Coalition at the University of Missouri. "They need to recognize that the instruments of the government don't belong to them. They belong to the people. Self-government doesn't work without information. Government records, including emails, ought to be available without filing a lawsuit, without any more than a keystroke."

"Here's the irony," Bunting added. "In a roundabout way, Romney and his aides may have done a favor for open government. I would imagine that, for the citizens of Massachusetts, buying your hard drive so things disappear doesn't pass the smell test. Everybody's going to know it was done for the purpose of hiding information from the public. Even if that's perfectly legal, people would say, ‘How can they get away with that?’ Maybe there will be a move to change the law."

Is open government on the list of issues you consider when you choose a candidate? Post your comments below.

The facts so far
Here's what's known about the case of the purged emails and missing boxes:

On Nov. 17, The Boston Globe reported that 11 members of Romney's staff bought 17 computer hard drives five years earlier. Of course, the staff were buying more than a used hard drive — they were buying the government records on those hard drives. What about the backup copies on state servers? Other computers in the governor's office were replaced as part of "routine maintenance."

Reuters moved the story forward on Dec. 6, documenting that the Romney administration spent $97,000 to replace computers, causing other emails to be lost. On its way out the door, the Romney team spent $205,000 for a three-year lease on computers for the governor's office, replacing a lease that had provided the same number of computers for $108,000.

Aides to Romney's successor, Gov. Deval Patrick, a Democrat, said they can't fulfill public records requests for the Romney administration's emails because the emails are gone. A spokesman for Romney's campaign blamed Patrick, a supporter of President Obama, for encouraging requests for public records, but didn't answer the question why the state computers were replaced, making the records unavailable to the public.

Then this Thursday, Reuters reported that the Romney administration got permission to destroy 150 boxes of paper records. A Romney spokeswoman wouldn't say whether the records were actually destroyed, but said the law was followed.

When the hard-drive story broke, Romney's staff emphasized that the purchases were legal. State law doesn't make it a crime to erase digital records, and state employees do have the option to buy the state computers they had used, though state officials said they can't recall anyone else buying just the hard drives.

Romney's reasons
The former governor has said the hard drives could have contained private information, such as "medical records, resumes from people who have applied for jobs, judicial appointments made, and people applying for those positions."

Keeping private information private wouldn't necessitate buying the hard drives, however. When government records are released to the public, it's common to redact, or withhold, information that is private, while disclosing the rest. If that weren't the law in every state, public officials could make every government record off limits to the public by merely writing their Social Security numbers or home telephone numbers at the bottom of the page. But state laws are an outdated patchwork when it comes to electronic information. Here's a guide to state laws on access to electronic information, from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.

Romney offered another rationale, in a subsequent interview with The Telegraph in Nashua, N.H., saying he had no obligation to help his political opponents. "Well, I think in government we should follow the law. And there has never been an administration" in Massachusetts, he said, "that has provided to the opposition research team, or to the public, electronic communications. So ours would have been the first administration to have done so."

Since then, he has dodged questions at campaign events about whether his computer was one of the ones that got a new memory, calling out to reporters "Thanks, guys," as he ducked into an SUV. If elected president, he said, he would follow a policy of transparency, doing "what is required by the law and then some."

On Dec. 7, The Boston Globe reported that previous Republican governors of Massachusetts had similarly wiped the slate clean, though the purchasing of home drives seems unprecedented. Tens of thousands of Cabinet secretary emails in the last three Republican gubernatorial administrations were automatically wiped off state computers after the officials left office, officials said.

A different set of records from the Romney administration will be made public. The Massachusetts secretary of the commonwealth will make available more than 460 boxes of archived documents.  These will be made available five boxes at a time — no word yet on when that will begin or how long that will take.

Other Romney records are already public, but clearly that's mostly chaff. "An Associated Press examination of much of the available Romney archives holdings earlier this year suggested the material available then was far from comprehensive. More than 75 cartons reviewed by the AP included staff and legislative documents but no internal records written to or from Romney himself — except for ceremonial bill-signing and official letters."

An issue in many states
One element of this case is unique to Massachusetts. Though the state law calls for retention of emails as public records, a 1997 ruling by the state's Supreme Judicial Court made gubernatorial records exempt from that public records law. The secretary of the commonwealth, William Galvin, a Democrat, said Romney still had an obligation to turn all records over to the state archives, not to allow employees to take them, even if they wouldn't have been subject to disclosure.

"I'm not aware of any other state where the governor's office has such a broad exemption," said Bunting at the freedom of information clearinghouse. "In a lot of states, judicial emails are exempted. In about half the states, the legislature isn't covered."

Don't miss that part. Legislators tend to exempt themselves from state and federal records laws. That's why you're not reading emails from Barack Obama's term in the Illinois Senate, or Newt Gingrich's tenure as speaker of the House.

But other elements of this story are more common from state to state. Republican and Democratic governors have fought to keep public records out of the reach of the public. In Washington state, for example, Gov. Christine Gregoire, a Democrat, has exerted executive privilege to block access to records, in a case about to go to the state Supreme Court. And in Texas, presidential candidate  Gov. Rick Perry's staff has argued that it must keep emails for only seven days before purging them, because of a supposed lack of disk space for storage. Perry's office said the policy was the same one followed by his predecessor, George W. Bush.

The value of such records was demonstrated again this month in South Carolina, where Gov. Nikki Haley, a Republican, sought the office on a platform of transparency in government. The State newspaper reported that her office had deleted most of its emails. Then emails did emerge showing that Haley tried to steer a state health care panel to a conclusion that she preordained.

Lessons from history
Romney's opponents haven't made much of the document purge. Newt Gingrich did make a comment, "in non-candidate mode," asking, "They did what?" And he added in another of his roles that it would make a good twist in a political thriller, "As a novelist, by the way, it's a lot of fun."

After Romney's non-explanatory explanations, the Erasergate story has dropped from Washington political media reports on the campaign.

"I'm not surprised that it hasn't had more legs, given what passes for journalism these days," said Mark Feldstein, a historian, former investigative correspondent for CNN and ABC and now a professor of broadcast journalism at the University of Maryland. "These records don't belong to Mitt Romney or his staff. Those computers are paid for by the taxpayers, and they were working on taxpayer time."

Feldstein, who wrote a history of Washington scandals called "Poisoning the Press: Richard Nixon, Jack Anderson, and the Rise of Washington's Scandal Culture," said historians "are concerned, how are they going to write the history of these times if so much is on email and so few emails are preserved."

But politicians now, he said, are more savvy than in President Nixon's day.

"The great lesson learned from the Nixon administration wasn't to be more honest, but to not get caught, to make sure you don't leave a trail behind you," Feldstein said.

"Mitt Romney's father was a Cabinet secretary for Nixon, and no one in his administration would have been impervious to that lesson. George Romney was HUD secretary. The lesson was clear: Too much disclosure can torpedo an elected president, much less a presidential candidate."

We sent questions to the Romney campaign: Why did the staff purchase the hard drives? Was it to keep emails out of public hands? What is the campaign's position on open and transparent government? We heard no reply.

What do you think? Are you interested in holding public officials accountable for open government? Comment below.

"I think it matters more to the people like us," lamented Feldstein, the historian and former journalist, "than it does to the public."

DigitalGlobe / AP

This satellite image provided by the the DigitalGlobe Analysis Center shows the Chinese aircraft carrier Shi Lang (Varyag) sailing in the Yellow Sea. The picture was acquired Dec. 8 by DigitalGlobe's QuickBird satellite.

A commercial satellite operator says it has captured a rare image of China's first aircraft carrier as it sailed through the Yellow Sea, after going through an exercise that's the 21st-century equivalent of finding a needle in a haystack.

DigitalGlobe said the aircraft carrier showed up on a cloud-filled picture snapped on Dec. 8 by its polar-orbiting QuickBird satellite from a height of 280 miles (450 kilometers). An analyst spotted the ship while checking the image on Tuesday, said Stephen Wood, the director of the company's analysis center.

"There is something that is always indispensable about having people involved," Wood told me. The ship was identified "using a combination of the satellite imagery plus open-source material on the Internet, and geography," he said, but "at the end of the day, it still comes down to a person."

Experts have been hoping for months to get a glimpse of the aircraft carrier at sea. The former Soviet Union started building the ship, originally known as the Varyag, but never finished it. After the Soviet breakup, the Varyag ended up in the hands of the Ukrainian government. The ship was auctioned off to the Chinese in 1998. Since then, the Varyag, which has reportedly been rechristened the Shi Lang, has been under refurbishment for sea service.

"This is a ship and a story that has had legs for many years," Wood said.

DigitalGlobe

Don't feel bad if you can't spot the aircraft carrier in this wide-field version of the satellite image from QuickBird. It's in the very center of the picture.

DigitalGlobe said this picture was taken during the carrier's second sea trial, approximately 62 miles (100 kilometers) south-southeast of the port of Dalian. Wood said the picture indicates that the ship is "moving at a decent rate of speed, which would be expected in the middle of the ocean." The U.S. military could no doubt glean more information about the Shi Lang's status, from QuickBird's pictures as well as from classified, higher-resolution imagery.

China says the Shi Lang will be used for research and training, and the project is thought to be part of the country's strategy to expand its presence as a naval power. The Chinese military is expected to build more copies of the ship in coming years. In fact, sources told Reuters in July that a second aircraft carrier was under construction.

"China's next moves have to be watched carefully, or there eventually could be a negative impact on maritime safety in Asia," Yoshihiko Yamada, a professor at Japan's Tokai University, told Reuters at the time.

QuickBird's view of the Shi Lang serves as today's offering from the Cosmic Log Space Advent Calendar, which features an image of Earth from space every day from now until Christmas. Here are the past offerings in the series:

• The full Cosmic Log Space Advent Calendar
• Dec. 1: An ornament in outer space
• Dec. 2: The masses in Mecca
• Dec. 3: Santa's shrinking domain
• Dec. 4: The monster of Madagascar
• Dec. 5: Antarctica stripped naked
• Dec. 6: Streaking for home
• Dec. 7: Pearl Harbor from above, 1941-2011
• Dec. 8: The rise and fall of the Dead Sea
• Dec. 9: How an eclipse dims Earth
• Dec. 10: Psychedelic storm
• Dec. 11: Beauty of the Inland Sea
• Dec. 12: Drone-spotting stirs up debate
• Dec. 13: Light up your St. Lucy's Day
• Hubble calendar, from The Atlantic's In Focus
• 2011 Zooniverse Advent calendar

Update for 10:45 p.m. ET: The Associated Press' Dan Elliott got in touch with a Pentagon spokeswoman, Cmdr. Leslie Hull-Ryde, who said the progress made by the Chinese on the aircraft carrier was in line with the U.S. military's expectations. A Defense Department report to Congress said the carrier could become operationally available to China's navy by the end of next year, but without aircraft. "From that point, it will take several additional years before the carrier has an operationally viable air group," Hull-Ryde told Elliott in an email.