Query: 1) Just who has so much political juice as to kick the A.G.'s office into high gear to protect the Envision Ogden culprits; and, 2) What exactly is in those documents which the government lawyers are working so feverishly to hide?
For those readers closely following Dan Schroeder's Envision Ogden GRAMA Documents Request Saga, we're pleased to highlight the latest news in the matter, via yesterday's Cathy McKitrick/Salt Lake Tribune story:
Both Dr. Schroeder and Mark Shurtleff's Utah Attorney General's Office have filed pleadings with Utah's Third District Court, appealing the April 22, 2011 decision of the State Records Committee, which was for the most part favorable to Dr. Schroeder. Whereas Dr. Schroeder now merely seeks the release of the final few documents which were ruled to be "protected" under that earlier order however, the A.G.'s Office is reportedly hell-bent on a wholesale reversal of the committee's decision, and thus apparently now seeks to block the release of over 300 documents, including the very bank records which could reveal the names of the culprit (or culprits) behind the Friends of Northern Utah Real Estate scam.
This latest pro-secrecy action on the part of the A.G.'s Office flies flagrantly in the face of the intent of the current Utah GRAMA law, which generally favors open records, and invites the two-pronged question: 1) Just who has so much political juice as to kick the A.G.'s office into high gear to protect the Envision Ogden culprits, and 2) What exactly is in those documents which the government lawyers are working so feverishly to hide?
Update 9/23/11 8:00 a.m.: For those readers who'd like to dive a little more deeply into the issues involved in this round of litigation, here are the pleadings which are now on file with the Third District Court:
Update 9/23/11 10:00 a.m.: Not to be outpaced by the Trib, Scott Schwebke provides his own morning version of the story too:
Friday, September 23, 2011
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