If you didn't already know, the IRS has stated that they "lost" about two years worth of Lois Lerner's e-mails that the House of Representatives had subpoenaed. Because her computer "crashed".
Oops. We all make mistakes!
I mean, it's impossible that any sort of backup or retrieval could happen. I mean, computers are just magical things that no one really understands. Sometimes bad stuff just happens, right? I know, it's convenient that it just so happens these were e-mails that would possibly prove a criminal conspiracy, but I guess anything's possible, right?
Well, it just so happens that the IRS has now claimed that six more employees who were the target of a Congressional inquiry have all lost their e-mail as well - all in computer crashes. Essentially, they've lost another submarine.
This is simply not plausible. It's not plausible that seven different people, who all happened to be under investigation, all lost their e-mail in the same way, and there's no way to retrieve the e-mails.
We lawyers have a word for this. When you destroy or lose evidence in a civil case, it's called "spoliation". If you lose or destroy evidence, the trial court takes a negative inference against you, and then you lose the darn case. In my practice, I've had trial courts hold opposing parties accountable for destroyed digital information by taking a negative inference against them.
But the IRS is claiming that all this just accidentally happened. They're not criminal; they're just incompetent.
They ought to subpoena every single IT administrator at the IRS and question them under oath.
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