A number of attorneys at the SEC were not getting enough stimulation from their securities work, so they turned to porn. Lots and lots of porn — one attorney ran out of room on his computer and had to start storing his porn on CDs and DVDs in boxes in his office, according to the Inspector General’s report earlier this year.

Who were these attorneys who, for so many years, were more focused on wanking it than spanking the Madoffs? We don’t know. The 33 XXX-site-surfing SEC employees — mostly accountants and attorneys — were identified only by their work titles in the Inspector General report and not by name.

According to the Denver Post, the SEC turned down FOIA requests from both the Washington Times and Colorado attorney Kevin Evans, seeking the names of employees involved in the scandal. From the Denver Post:

[T]he SEC maintains in court records that the request for employee names and discipline is an invasion of privacy.

“Public identification of the Commission staff could conceivably subject them to harassment and annoyance of the conduct of their official duties and in their private lives,” a government legal adviser wrote in a denial of Evans’ FOIA request.

Evans is a former partner at Hogan & Hartson and Schiff Hardin, and is now a name partner at his own firm. And he was not content to have his FOIA turned down. He sued the SEC last month, and will let the courts decide if this is a true invasion of privacy.

His justification: how would your clients feel if you were billing them for “rubbing the redweld” while looking at www.ladyboyjuice.com?

Taxpayer clients were paying these BigGov salaries after all:

“Many of the employees who engaged in such conduct were at a senior level and earned substantial salaries through their government employment,” the OIG report says. “The employees found to have engaged in this inappropriate conduct included 17 employees at a level of grade SK-14 and above (which can range from $99,356 through $222,418).”

Kevin Evans

We spoke with Kevin Evans yesterday. “I’ve been involved in white collar and SEC work for the bulk of my career,” said Evans, a partner at Steese, Evans, Frankel and former partner at Hogan & Hartson (now Hogan Lovells) in Denver and Schiff Hardin in Chicago. “I could curl your hair with tales of government abuse.”

(Our hair is already wavy though, thanks to stories we’ve heard from friends in BigGov.)

Evans told us that he was outraged as a taxpayer, and disgusted as a lawyer. He expressed similar sentiments to the Denver Post:

“As a lawyer, quite frankly, I am disgusted by what happened here,” Evans said. “If I or any other lawyer in private practice had sat and done what these individuals did and billed a client for it . . . we would be disciplined and severe action would be taken against our license.”

The SEC has until the first week of July to respond to his suit. We asked why a partner in Denver had to step in to pursue this.

Seeking an appeal to the FOIA rejection takes resources, responded Evans. “It costs money to do this. Money’s tight these days.”

One of the SEC porn-lovers wants to keep his habits under wrap. John Doe — a former or present SEC employee trying desperately to prevent his information from being disclosed — filed a motion in the U.S. District Court in Denver asking the judge to deny the request for his personnel records. Will the attorneys at the Sex Securities and Exchange Commission be outed? Stay tuned.

“This is public information,” said Evans. “The public has a right to it.”

Denver motion aims to seal data on SEC employee who viewed porn at work [Denver Post]

Earlier: Securities Law Not Sexy Enough, So SEC Attorneys Turn To Porn