A second report on the Alaska "Troopergate" scandal was released yesterday. The Anchorage Daily News reports:

The state Personnel Board-sanctioned investigation is the second into whether Palin violated state ethics law in firing her public safety commissioner, and it contradicts the earlier findings by a special counsel hired by the state Legislature.

Both investigations found that Palin was within her rights to fire Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan.

But the new report says the Legislature's investigator was wrong to conclude that Palin abused her power by allowing aides and her husband, Todd, to pressure Monegan and others to dismiss her ex-brother-in-law, Trooper Mike Wooten. Palin was accused of firing Monegan after Wooten stayed on the job.

UPDATE: The Washington Post covers the report here. The story contains a significant error:

After Palin was selected as Sen. John McCain's running mate, her attorneys attempted to take the investigation out of the hands of the legislative investigator by asking her handpicked three-person State Personnel Board to look into the matter.

As several commenters have noted, there is nothing "handpicked" about the State Personnel Board. All three members of the Board were originally appointed by Gov. Palin's predecessor, Frank Murkowski (who she challenged and defeated in the primary election). Gov. Palin subsequently reappointed one of the three, and could still reappoint the others when their terms end, but she has yet to do so. Further, the investigator who conducted the investigation for the Board was an independent attorney who is a registered Democrat and had been a supporter of former Governor Tony Knowles, who Palin defeated in the general election. Whatever the flaws of the new report, it is not the product of a Palin's "handpicked" Board.

The New York Times, on the other hand, got this part of the story right.