A few days ago the Washington State Supreme Court ruled out that the state’s Public Records Act shouldn’t be applicable to court records. It was explained, however, that the recent State Supreme Court ruling shouldn’t affect directly current pending lawsuits over whether the names of parties involved in court cases should become public or not, the more so that the Public Records Law has been the matter of multiple lawsuits almost simultaneously.
The ruling came in a response to lawsuit stemmed from requesting public records by an activist David Koenig 2 years ago, who then had asked for the release of all public records pertaining the resignation of Federal Way Municipal Court Judge Colleen Hartl, specifically wishing the disclosure of both incoming and outboud correspondence of Mr. Morgan, the municipal court’s presiding judge. Hartl had to resign following the exposure of her affair with a public defender who frequently appeared before her in the court. It was specifically the presiding judge Morgan’s correspondence that was refused to be released by municipal court for public inspection.
The President of the Washington Coalition for Open Government Toby Nixon said the public activist group he leads would file official request with the Legislature asking to amend the current law’s language so that it would specifically include court records too. It is quite interesting that the Supreme Court ruling contradicts its previous ruling made this summer in favour of the release of records involving Judge Morgan. As for the recent duling of the Supreme court, it in fact allows exemption for all judges withing the state of Washington jurisdiction from disclosure of their professional communications as defined by open records law.
