Sharon Rondeau - Results of [Obama Birth] Investigation

8/9/2019 Sharon Rondeau - Results of [Obama Birth] Investigation

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Sharon Rondeau Results of [Obama birth] Investigation

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MRS. RONDEAU: How long were you in Hawaii doing this investigation?

RESEARCHER: I was in Honolulu for approximately three days. I arrived in the middle ofthe day on a Tuesday. My first stop was the State Library to review the Oahu PolksDirectories to confirm the address history of Stanley, Madelyn and Stanley Ann Dunham andsome other persons of interest. I also verified that Barack Obama Sr. appeared in the Polks

Directory. I looked for the name Lolo Soetoro, but I never did find a record of him in thedirectories I looked at. However, from the passport information that was recently released2 asa result of the Chris Strunk FOIA request, it appears that Lolo was in Honolulu as early as1962.

I looked at the Polks Directory starting with 1959-1960, which would have been complied in1959 and published in 1960, and the Dunhams were not in there. They appeared in thefollowing year, 1960-61, and I went through the directories up to 1965-66 when I had a hardstop because the library was closing. The Dunhams appeared to have lived at the birthaddress for two years and then had at least three different addresses listed in the remainingdirectories. After Ann returned from Seattle, she is listed in the 1962-1963 directory as AnnObama and residing at the same address as her parents. In all the subsequent listings, she islisted an Ann Dunham and had the same address as her parents.

I was able to capture images of all of this information. I had previously done some work withanother researcher last winter, and I do have confirmation from the University of Washingtons Special Collection Archives that Stanley Ann appeared in the Seattle PolksDirectory in 1961-62. The Dunhams appeared in the 1959-1960 King County directory whichat that point in time, I believe included all of the surrounding area, excluding Seattle. Theiraddress was traced to an apartment located on Mercer Island, which is directly east of Seattle.So everything seemed to be in order in regard to the address history that has been publishedover the last couple of years.

MRS. RONDEAU: So the Dunhams really did live on Mercer Island, which is part of thestate of Washington, and they really did go to Hawaii as has been stated.

RESEARCHER: Yes. The only thing that isnt clear is the timing of when they actuallymoved, because its very difficult to ascertain other than the year as to when the PolksDirectories are published.

MRS. RONDEAU: Do you know for a fact that when you look at a Polks Directory, it waspublished a year after the information that it contains?

RESEARCHER: Actually, it says that it covers a two-year span. For example, 1960-61 would

have been compiled, I believe, in 1960 and published in 1961. But there is no month ofpublication indicated; it just has the year. I had contacted Polks Directory some time ago tofind out if there were any historical archives to see if I could determine when the Dunhamsmoved. I assume it was probably sometime in the summer of 1960 after Ann graduated fromhigh school. Its too bad I had a hard stop due to the library closing; there is a plethora ofother historical information there. They have a microfiche archive of both the Honolulu Advertiser and the Star-Bulletin, various high school yearbooks including Punahou HighSchools during the Obama Years and old phone books. If someone plans to visit Hawaii inthe near future, it would be particularly interesting to see what is contained in the yearbooks.


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MRS. RONDEAU: What was the next place you visited?

RESEARCHER: The next morning, I went directly to the Department of Health, and myprimary objective was to determine whether or not Mr. Obama appeared in the 1960-64Index. There was another person who had visited Hawaii, I believe in early March, and whenthat person asked for and reviewed the index data they swore up and down that they looked

for Mr. Obamas name and couldnt find it. I looked up some other names as well to basicallyconfirm the veracity of the book that I was looking at; ones that I knew had taken place because they had birth announcements within the same time frame as Mr. Obamas. Forexample, I looked for and located Norman Asing, who appeared in the same birthannouncement as Mr. Obama. I also looked for and located the Nordyke twins,3 and Irandomly looked for a couple of other names just to get a sense of what I was looking at.

In the 1960-1964 birth index, I also looked for any Soetoros and Dunhams, in which I locatedneither. I also reviewed the 1955-1959 birth index searching for Dunhams, Obamas andSoetoros just in case there was a chance that Mr. Obama appeared in an earlier index asopposed to the 1960-64 index. There were two girls with the surname of Dunham in thisdirectory, but other than that, there were no matches for either Obama or Soetoro.

Now when I was looking at the index, for some reason, I had a senior moment, and I didntremember seeing it, but I actually captured an image of the page on which Mr. Obamas nameappears. In regard to the other indexes, I looked at the 1960-65 marriage index by groom andconfirmed that Obama Sr. was listed there as a groom and Stanley Ann as the bride to confirmthat there was a record that he was married to Stanley Ann. I also wanted to see if there was arecord for Ann and Lolo, and I looked at the 1966-1970 groom marriage index, and it wasntin there, but I didnt look for it in the 1960-65 groom marriage index. I also reviewed the bride index for 1960-65, and there were actually two entries in that one for Ann for bothmarriages. Essentially what they have are marriage indexes that are sorted by brides name,and sorted by grooms name, so you can look them up either way.

Based on that, it was very clear to me that Ann and Lolo were married in 1965, and I think therelease of the passport record confirms that they were married in March of 1965.

MRS. RONDEAU: I dont know if you found it in your research, but the release of StanleyAnns passport records shows a date of March 5, 1964 on one application, and March 15, 1965on another application. Also, two different locations for the marriage were provided.

RESEARCHER: Yes, one was Molokai, and other was Maui, I believe. They are two differentislands.

MRS. RONDEAU: Was there anything in the index data you saw that indicated there weretwo different locations?

RESEARCHER: No, there wasnt. The only data contained in the marriage index is thename of the bride, the name of the groom and that it occurred within the year range specifiedon the index cover and the index pages themselves. However, through reasonable deduction, Iwas able to determine that Lolo and Ann did, in fact, marry in 1965.


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MRS. RONDEAU: When you asked to see these materials, was there any difficulty ingetting them?

RESEARCHER: No, not at all. When I entered the office, I was quite surprised, because itwas very antiquated and it was quite obvious that the offices had not been renovated in many,many years, if ever. There were no cameras in the lobby, which is very small; the square

footage of the lobby is probably no more than 300 square feet at most. There are no stairs oranything like that, just an area where people get in line to make their requests, something onthe order of a ticket counter. Directly to your right when you walk in the door, theres acounter where you fill out forms to obtain copies of your Certificate of Live Birth or a deathcertificate or marriage license on the spot.

The request form for a Certificate of Live Birth, for example, contains, among other things, allof the information that appears on the Certificate of Live Birth. When the COLB is printed, allof the information including the border, department seal (not the raised seal), the form fieldsand personal data comes from the database. In other words, the form feedstock is completelyblank; nothing is preprinted on it.

Anyway, when it was my turn, I went up to one of the service windows which is glass-encased, with a hole to speak to the clerk through and a pass-through for documents directlyunderneath. The first indexes I asked for were the 1960-64 birth index, the 1960-1965marriage index, and a death index to explore the possibility that Mr. Obama may have usedsomeone elses certificate number. I had to print and sign my name and give them myidentification, which they kept until I was finished, but I didnt have to provide any otherinformation aside from my name. Whether or not they made a photocopy of myidentification, while I was examining the indexes, I cant say. They then stamp the log with anold-fashioned date-stamper. Im not absolutely positive, but it looks as if the last person tohave requested to review index data was several weeks prior to my request unless theymaintain a sign-in log at each of the service windows. The clerk went to a shelf located behind

the counter to search for and locate the indexes I requested and gave them to me via the pass-through. I took the indexes to the counter where you fill out record request forms to examinethem and make digital images.

MRS. RONDEAU: Thats very interesting. Did you say that you saw the name of BarackHussein Obama II?

RESEARCHER:Yes, I did.

MRS. RONDEAU: Was there anything unusual about the names appearance in the list?Did it look just the same as all the other names?

RESEARCHER: It looked just the same. Basically, they use data binders for these indexes.Data binders have a cardboard-like cover with two long prongs that feeds up through thebottom and a retainer to secure the prongs on the top so you can insert whatever thicknessyou want. All of the books appear to be about the same quality and age, including the 1960-64birth index. The only variation that I observed was the color of the index cover and all of theindexes binders were covered with the content and the years that they spanned. As for thepages themselves, they each contain two pages of computer-generated index data with the


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MRS. RONDEAU: And is irregularity how you would characterize it?

RESEARCHER: I would characterize that as an anomaly, yes.

MRS. RONDEAU: So did the report have a different setup?

RESEARCHER: Yes. Its a supposition at this point in time. I suspect that they have astandard report which includes the print parameters in all of the aforementioned indexes butthis index was slightly different, and its quite possible that a custom report was generated because Mr. Obamas registration was inserted or it perhaps does not fall within that daterange.

MRS. RONDEAU: So if someone entered his name after the fact, for example, in 2007 orafter?

RESEARCHER: Or in 1981, if it was a foreign birth registration.

MRS. RONDEAU:And then they entered it as August 4, 1961?

RESEARCHER: I dont know. I suspect that what the DoH did is created a custom report toidentify all births that were registered between 1960 and 1964, and added Mr. Obama as anadditional parameter, regardless of when he was actually registered or added to thedatabase. I think that it would be helpful to gather some more information from someonewho has a little bit more technical knowledge than I do in regard to databases. I have some,but I am by no means an expert. Based on my reasoning, I think thats what happened.

MRS. RONDEAU: To your knowledge, does the Hawaii Department of Health maintainhandwritten books? Mr. John Charlton, Founder and Editor Emeritus of The Post & Email,had requested4 copies of handwritten birth index pages some months ago. Do you know ifthey still maintain those or if theyre available to the public?

RESEARCHER: I dont know for certain. I have extensively reviewed a document titledDepartment of Health Specific Record Retention Schedule, which states that they have tomaintain permanent records of the various indexes: General, Certificate of Hawaiian Birth,Late/Delayed Registrations and Foreign Births. It does not specify in which form the recordsmust kept or if obsolete indexes must be retained and archived. I suspect that when they wentto a computerized system, its possible the handwritten indexes were destroyed since thecomputer database and the back-up tapes became the new permanent index.

The DoH has maintained all along that it does not have any handwritten indexes and another

dedicated researcher verified that the State Archives does not possess them either. I dontknow if they did any intentional destruction or not or if they are being less than forthcomingin regard to the handwritten indexes existence.

MRS. RONDEAU: Does that go for any year span?

RESEARCHER: Yes, I believe if theyve destroyed anything intentionally or otherwise, itsreally unfortunate, because of the historical value from an archive standpoint. As I stated, it


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very well could be that the DoH still has these handwritten indexes and they are just denyingit and thus denying access.

MRS. RONDEAU: Mr. Charlton had requested copies of handwritten pages but receivedsomething entirely different.5 He received a computer printout at no charge, which isunusual.

RESEARCHER: I believe he received a copy of what appears to be the index for Certificateof Hawaiian Birth from which they had redacted some information but included moreinformation than they were required by law to provide. All they are required to release forbirth and death indexes is first name, last name and gender. It was printed on what I call old-fashioned green bar paper, and it had been redacted before being sent to Mr. Charlton. WhenI finished reviewing the first set of indexes I requested, I wanted to verify theDunham/Soetoro marriage, and I wanted to review the 1955-1959 birth index. I actually hadthe opportunity to speak with Jesse, the supervisor, because he happened to be at the windowwhere I made my second request.

I asked him directly whether or not the birth indexes also included Certificate of HawaiianBirths, Late/Delayed registrations and Foreign Births and he told me no. The indexes onlycovered births which had occurred at a hospital or at home and were registered within thelegal parameters of a normal registration. I then asked if I could see the other indexes, towhich he replied no. It was not clear based on his response if they did not exist or that Icould not see them.

MRS. RONDEAU: So do you think he was holding back something that you had askedabout?

RESEARCHER: I would say he was informing me in sort-of an indirect manner that theydidnt have them, and even if they did, I couldnt see them.

MRS. RONDEAU:And you said one of those was the Delayed/Late registration index book?

RESEARCHER: Yes.

MRS. RONDEAU: What would that have in it?

RESEARCHER: I think the parameters would look identical to the General Birth indexexcept that it would be identified in the header that it was the Late and/or Delayed BirthIndex.

MRS. RONDEAU: If someone had been born in another state or country and moved toHawaii with parents or other relatives, is that the book in which that persons name wouldappear?

RESEARCHER: If they were born in another state, it is hard to say in which index theywould appear. I think it would depend on the circumstances and timing of the registration.The DoH Specific Records Retention Schedule makes no mention that it is required to retainan index for births that occurred in a different state. Based on that, I believe they wouldappear in the General or Late/Delayed index, depending on the timing of the registration. If it


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was an out-of-country birth, I believe the name would appear in the Foreign Birth index which would include the same parameters as the General Index with the exception of theheader; it would be identified as the Foreign Birth Index.

MRS. RONDEAU: But you were not allowed to see the other index books?

RESEARCHER: Correct. I then asked if I could have a copy of those specific persons indexdata if I requested it, and I was told No, I could not, because it would contain way too muchinformation, and I said, Well, what if you redacted all of the information with the exceptionof what appeared in the birth index? and again, I was told, No.

MRS. RONDEAU: Do you think that was an irregularity or was that in conformance withtheir state statute?

RESEARCHER: I really think its in conformance with the state statute. The administrativerules for the UIPA law6 require them to make reasonable accommodations, not only toinspect records, but the rules also allow the release of copies. I didnt ask for a copy of anindex page, since I had made my own images, but I do believe that they are legally obligatedto provide a copy of a page had I requested one. There are other researchers, including Mr.Charlton, who have obtained copies of pages containing vital event index data.

MRS. RONDEAU: So are the Department of Healths responses haphazard? Do they sayyes when they feel like it and no when they dont?

RESEARCHER: No, I didnt get that sense at all. Again, I did not ask for a copy of a page.Had I asked for a copy of a page and they had told me no, I was prepared to pull out therequirement that says that they have to provide a copy if requested in the form that therequester wants it, but I didnt ask for it. In hindsight, that was probably an error on my part. As for dealing with the DoH from a remote location such as the Mainland, I think their

responses are haphazard as you said.

There was one other noteworthy thing that happened at the Department of Health. Notrecalling that I had actually viewed Mr. Obamas index data, when I took back the last set ofindex books I reviewed, I said, Well, I didnt find the name that I was looking for and that Iwas looking for Mr. Obamas. The clerk looked really puzzled, and she went back and pulledout the book and pulled out a page from the binder and brought the single page over for me to view, which I took over to the counter, and I made an image of that as well. So I have animage of it in the book and as a single page. I thought there was something nefarious going onthe first time when I thought it wasnt there when they produced it on-demand, but it was inthe book when it was in my possession, and the image I have absolutely confirms that I

scanned it the first time when I had it.

MRS. RONDEAU: Was there anything unusual about his name on the single page?

RESEARCHER: The only other observation that could be made about the Obama entry inthe index is that they had highlighted it with a yellow highlighter.

MRS. RONDEAU: Were there any other names highlighted?


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RESEARCHER: His was the only one that I saw that was highlighted.

MRS. RONDEAU: Did the clerk make any comment about it?

RESEARCHER: No. Both images that I have are in color and it was apparent to me thatthey were one and the same page.

MRS. RONDEAU: But someone highlighted the name.

RESEARCHER:Yes, I think it was just to help people out. I think its safe to say that Im notthe only person who has gone into the Department of Health looking for Mr. Obamas indexdata.

After that, because of some information that I had obtained from another researcher, I begananother leg of my investigation. There is speculation that because Mr. Obama has a certificatenumber that is higher than the Nordyke twins7who were born on August 5, 1961 at KapiolaniWomen and Childrens Hospital,8 yet their births were registered on August 11, 1961, threedays after Mr. Obamas was allegedly registered and that he is using the certificate number ofanother infant born within a certain date range and registered on August 11th which was aFriday and no later than Monday, August 14th. It depends on what time of the day theNordyke twins birth certificates were processed; the certificate number that Mr. Obama wasallegedly assigned was likely assigned the same day as the Nordykes.

MRS. RONDEAU: What is the relationship between the certificate number of the Nordykesand the number on the FactCheck-Obama9 document online?

RESEARCHER: The Nordyke twins birth certificate numbers are either 151-1961-010636/37 or 151-1961-010638/39, because only one of the twins birth certificates is postedonline10 and that was the one identified with the certificate number 010638. Mr. Obamascertificate was allegedly processed on August 8th and has the number 010641, which is nomore than two or three numbers higher than the one Nordyke twin certificate number. I haveconfirmation from the DoH in response to UIPA requests I made last winter that the numberswere not preprinted on the form. The numbers were assigned by the Department of Healthwhen the birth registration was accepted by the State Registrar, and only in the DoH mainoffice located in Honolulu.

MRS. RONDEAU: So as a birth occurred and the information reached the Department ofHealth, a number was assigned.

RESEARCHER:Yes, and I believe that regardless of the actual birth date, they just assigned

the next sequential number when the birth registration was processed. I dont think there isnecessarily any attempt on their part to order them by birth date.

MRS. RONDEAU: Is there any other information that you think our readers would like toknow about?

RESEARCHER: I think that is a significant anomaly. Based on the information thats beengathered thus far and the procedures used by the Department of Health during this timeperiod, I just dont think that its feasible that Mr. Obamas certificate number could possibly


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be three or four numbers higher and accepted three days earlier than those of the Nordyketwins, which leads me to believe that that number belongs to another person and in alllikelihood, it could belong to the infant or young child that was born within a certain daterange whose birth was registered on August 11th that later died shortly after the birth or within a couple of years. I really cant elaborate beyond that since there is still ongoingresearch to see if we can identify the person certificate number 010641 could possibly belong

to. Were trying to obtain some official HI documents that will aid in our research with thegenerous help of The Post & Email Legal Fund and its donors.

MRS. RONDEAU: There have been reports and affidavits signed by licensed investigatorsthat Obama is using a social security number11 that had been previously assigned to someone,and the Social Security Administration has been quoted as having said that numbers arenever reassigned. And now your research raises the question as to whether or not hiscertificate number could have previously been assigned.

RESEARCHER: Yes, were trying to ascertain to whom it may have been actually assignedand explore the possibility of obtaining a certified copy of the long-form birth certificatewhich, contrary to what has been reported, the DoH still issues. I dont know where Ive seenthe statement12 supporting the Department of Healths contention that it now issues only aCertificate of Live Birth, but its not true. When I was at the Department of Health, I observeda woman who was directly in front of me in line order a copy of her long-form birthcertificate. She was told that it would take about a week to obtain. She made arrangements topick it up at the DoH office in lieu of having it mailed to her since she worked across thestreet.

MRS. RONDEAU: So they do still issue the long form. That announcement they made lastyear could have been a smokescreen to legitimize the COLB that appeared online.

RESEARCHER: We have two document requests in process. Again, in all likelihood, if the

Department of Health were going to reassign a number to give to Mr. Obama, it wouldprobably be one that belonged to an infant that died shortly after birth or a child who died within a couple of years. With the help from donors to The Post & Emails Legal Fund, wewould like to obtain two sets of other official HI documents that we can cross-check against tospeed up our research efforts.

MRS. RONDEAU: Do you have any idea of the cost of what youre requesting now?

RESEARCHER: We know the cost of the first set of documents because it was previouslyquoted in the AP article13 and based on what another researcher was informed when theymade an identical request. Contrary to what was reported in the AP article, a researcher

submitted payment to the DoH for the requested documents and it was rejected due to a fine-print technicality that time for the requester to respond had run out. That point is disputedby the researcher. I estimate the cost for those documents to be in the $100-$115 range. Ithink it really depends on the shipment method the requester specifies and the correspondingcosts. I estimate the cost of the other documents we requested to be within the same range.

MRS. RONDEAU: Did they deny the other researchers request legitimately, or do youthink they were simply looking for an excuse not to send it?


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RESEARCHER: I think they were looking for an excuse not to send it.

MRS. RONDEAU: Given that, what causes you to believe that you or whomever requests itwill actually obtain it?

RESEARCHER: Because Ive asked for it directly, and the other persons request started

back in the winter for the handwritten index; their request was very similar to Mr. Charltons.

MRS. RONDEAU: And the Department of Health is maintaining that there are nohandwritten records?

RESEARCHER: Yes, and then they offered a computer printout, and then some time hadelapsed. The Department of Health has a rule that if the requester doesnt respond within 20days, they consider the matter closed. The requester did provide payment once they knewhow much it was, and I believe within a seven-day period, no less, so I really think that theyrejected it without due cause.

MRS. RONDEAU: So they could have fulfilled the request and were using a technicality todeny it?

RESEARCHER: Yes. I sent a UIPA request last Saturday requesting the identical document,and I actually referenced the AP article that you recently wrote about in which the DoHCommunications Director Janice Okubo stated it was available for $98.75 but that no one hadcome forward with the funds to obtain it. Thanks to the generous donation from The Post &Email Legal Fund,14 I have already remitted a payment along with the request.

MRS. RONDEAU: Is there anything youd like to add about your investigation?

RESEARCHER: No, other than please keep contributing, if at all possible, to the LegalFund. The Post & Email has been the only source of research funding for private citizens suchas myself, and your donations are needed in order for us to be able to reveal the truth, onceand for all.

End Notes:

1 http://www.thepostemail.com/legal-fund/

2 http://www.thepostemail.com/2010/08/01/inconsistencies-found-in-passport-

applications-released-by-state-department-for-obamas-alleged-mother/

3 http://myveryownpointofview.wordpress.com/2009/12/29/nordyke-twins-newspaper-birth-announcement-found/

4 http://www.thepostemail.com/2010/04/08/did-hawaii-have-any-records-on-obama-before-2006/


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Documents

Sharon Rondeau - Results of [Obama Birth] Investigation