There is nothing in HRCT's Pr that says E-Trade was in error. Why do you not think that those 144 holders were not the ones who requested E-Trade to file the 144 and free the shares for sale? If it was E-Trade why would they file on 2 different dates and just for some of the 144 holders and not all? And since the 144 forms had to go through HRCT's transfer agent prior to being filed with NASDAQ, isn't that going through HRCT first? Those forms would have never made it to NASDAQ's posting without the approval of the transfer agent on behalf of HRCT.
I don't see anything in your information that would indicate that E-Trade was doing any shorting.