surely the investigation should have remit to add questions as it goes if they’re warranted by information it’s turned up?
Yeah, absolutely. What I had in mind when I wrote this was this excerpt from an outstanding comment from Jason on the Mintz investigation; I’d hope these ideas could help inform the structure of a future investigation:
How The Investigation Could Have Actually Rebuilt Lost Trust and Confidence
There was a more transparent / credible way to do this. EVF could have released, in advance, an appropriate range of specific questions upon which the external investigator was being asked to make findings of fact—as well as a set of possible responses (on a scale of “investigation rules this out with very high confidence” to “investigation shows this is almost certain”). For example—and these would probably have several subquestions each—one could announce in advance that the following questions were in scope and that the investigator had committed to providing specific answers:
Did anyone associated with EVF ever raise concerns about SBF being engaged in fraudulent activity? Did they ever receive any such concerns?
Did anyone associated with EVF discourage, threaten, or seek to silence any person who had concerns about illegal, unethical, or fraudulent conduct by SBF? (cf. the “Will basically threatened Tara” report).
When viewed against the generally-accepted norms for donor vetting in nonprofits, was anyone associated with EVF negligent, grossly negligent, or reckless in evaluating SBF’s suitability as a donor, failing to raise concerns about his suitability, or choosing not to conduct further investigation?
That kind of pre-commitment would have updated my faith in the process, and my confidence that the investigation reached all important topics. If EVF chose not to release the answers to those questions, it would have known that we could easily draw the appropriate inferences. Under those circumstances—but not the actual circumstances—I would view willingness to investigate as a valuable signal.
Yeah, absolutely. What I had in mind when I wrote this was this excerpt from an outstanding comment from Jason on the Mintz investigation; I’d hope these ideas could help inform the structure of a future investigation: