While the state investigative panel hasn't had much to do until lately, their staff attorney has been keeping busy:
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On the second day of the George Washington Bridge lane closures last year...Port Authority police officer...Steve Pisciotta...picked up his radio. The traffic was creating “hazardous conditions” in Fort Lee, he told fellow officers...and the lanes needed to be re-opened. “Shut up,”...Port Authority police supervisor...(and) Deputy Inspector Darcy Licorish...allegedly replied, instructing the officer not to discuss the apparently secret operation over an open radio channel...Port Authority Police Lieutenant Thomas “Chip” Michaels...and a police sergeant then “visited (Pisciotta) in person at his post to tell him that his radio communication had been inappropriate...”
That exchange...is one of nearly a dozen accounts provided by an attorney representing rank-and-file police officers and given privately to lawmakers investigating the lane closures..The...officers...many (of whom) have already been interviewed by federal investigators...share common threads and provide vivid new details about how the operation was put into effect on a Monday morning last September...
The instructions about the new lane configuration, many of them said, were delivered at roll call before the morning rush hour on the first day by Michaels, who grew up with Governor Christie...He told the officers not to touch the traffic cones choking the number of access lanes out of Fort Lee from three down to one...Later that morning, officers said they saw Michaels driving David Wildstein — the Port Authority executive who ordered the closures and also grew up with Christie — around Fort Lee’s gridlocked streets...
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If the PA cops who would be patrolling the bridge were formally notified that the lanes were being closed off, why would it be "inappropriate" to discuss it among themselves? More important,
how can it be possibly be defined as a "secret?" From the summary (6-page PDF):
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On Thursday, September 12, (PA police officer Ray) Rodriguez (made) a pre-planned court appearance in Fort Lee. Rodriguez entered the court building through a restricted entrance for police and staff...(and) shared an elevator with a man on a cell phone who was saying that he had spoken to the Christie administration and that no one knew what was going on. He also said he had spoken to PA police union president Paul Nunziato, who likewise did not know what was going on. Afterwards, Rodriguez identified the man on the cell phone as (Fort Lee) Mayor Mark Sokolich, based on his later appearances in news coverage of the lane closures.
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During morning rush hour traffic, (PA police officer) Rajiv Sama('s) normal station is “Post 10,” which is the post that monitors Fort Lee’s three access lanes. Sama is typically the officer who puts the cones out each morning to segregate Fort Lee traffic from other Bridge traffic.
On September 9, 2013, however, Lt. Michaels instructed Sama during morning roll call that the lanes had already been coned off and that he was not to touch the(m)...When Sama later saw the new cone configuration, he noticed the cones were physically touching each other and immediately realized the lane reduction would create “a nightmare.” Sama would say Lt. Michaels instructed him that for that day and the rest of the week he was not to report to Post 10 but, instead...to the corner of Central Avenue and Bruce Reynolds Boulevard...(to) help manage traffic...(which he) described ...as “horrific.” To Sama’s knowledge, no one was assigned to replace him at Post 10.
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(PA police officer Angela) Tait was present with (officer Steve) Pisciotta when he made his radio request to remove the cones and reopen the Fort Lee lanes. She was also present when Lt. Michaels and Sgt. Rhem visited Pisciotta in person and instructed him not to further discuss the closures on air. Tait believes Dep. Insp. Licorish also gave a similar command in person...
Tait recalls telling upset motorists that they should call Mayor Sokolich’s office to complain...because she believed that if Mayor Sokolich personally called the Port Authority, the matter would be resolved relatively quickly...(not) because she thought the lane closures had political overtones.
For the rest of the week, Tait was assigned to the New York side of the Bridge...
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So I guess the next step is to find out who ordered the cones, who set them out, and who paid them to do it? Coming soon: Michaels' and Licorish's sides of the story.