BATON ROUGE – A state judge has turned down state Attorney General Jeff Landry’s bid to sideline a journalist’s quest to get copies of sexual harassment complaints against one of Landry’s top lieutenants.
Judge Tim Kelley on March 4 ruled against Landry in a lawsuit he filed in the 19th Judicial District against The Advocate reporter Andrea Gallo, saying he would order the release of redacted records relating to complaints against Deputy Attorney General Pat Magee. Kelley also awarded reasonable legal fees to Gallo’s counsel in a lawsuit that was universally panned by free-speech advocates.
“It is really problematic that the attorney general chose to file a lawsuit against a Louisiana citizen who was simply seeking public records from him,” Katie Schwartzmann, director of the First Amendment Law Clinic at Tulane University, told the Louisiana Record. “... I hope that the award of attorney fees and the (public) response will cause governmental actors to think twice before affirmatively filing lawsuits like this in the future.”
Tulane’s First Amendment Law Clinic filed an amicus brief on behalf of Gallo in the case and expressed particular concern about Landry’s attempt to seal the proceeding and place gag orders on the parties.
“He tried to seal the docket so the public could not see any of the filings,” Schwartzmann said.
Gallo’s employer provided an attorney to fight Landry’s lawsuit, she said, but many private citizens filing public records requests don’t have that level of representation. In turn, Louisiana citizens might have been deterred from seeking public records in the future had Landry’s lawsuit prevailed, according to Schwartzmann.
“Our state and lawmakers value public transparency and oversight of our democratic institutions,” she said, adding that lawsuits such as the one filed by Landry’s office can have a chilling effect on efforts to examine matters of public interest.
“There are a handful of cases like this,” Schwartzmann said. “It crops up periodically in Louisiana and elsewhere. It’s just bad public policy.”
The Washington-based Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press also criticized Landry for bringing the lawsuit against a journalist.
“Lawsuits like this one go against the spirit of Louisiana’s public records law and only serve to intimidate members of the press and public who ask questions about what their government is doing and how,” the committee’s executive director, Bruce Brown, said in a prepared statement.