‘Extremely unusual.’ CDT, local news organizations fight for sealed Penn State records
Three local media companies formally asked a Centre County judge Thursday to reverse her ruling that OK’d the wholesale sealing of documents at Penn State’s request, one that a government transparency advocate described as “unusual.”
Many details of the university’s June filings aren’t clear, aside from attorney John Snyder describing it as an “emergency.” The ruling that sealed the case was captioned, in part, “Search Warrants Involving Crime Victims Who Are Students of The Pennsylvania State University.”
Centre County President Judge Pamela Ruest approved the blanket sealing of the records without hearing from the two elected officials listed as defendants. One is the county’s top prosecutor, while the other is the gatekeeper of all criminal and civil records.
“They’re saying, ‘This is such a big emergency that we don’t have time to let the other side weigh in here.’ That in itself is extraordinary,” Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association attorney Melissa Melewsky said Tuesday. “Courts do not typically operate in an ex parte manner. The court is supposed to hear from both sides before it renders a decision, absent really, really unusual circumstances. That’s what Penn State has said in this case.”
Ruest granted access to some redacted documents late Thursday, hours after the media coalition’s filing, though copies were not immediately available before 5 p.m.
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press attorney Paula Knudsen Burke — who represents the Centre Daily Times, television station WJAC and digital media company Spotlight PA — argued Ruest’s earlier ruling was “extraordinarily broad.”
Existing and future filings were set to be kept from the public under that ruling. And the county’s top judge neither specified her findings nor outlined why less restrictive alternatives, like redaction, would be inadequate.
The documents, Burke wrote, come with a “presumptive right of access.”
“This presumption — which is always weighty — has particular force here because the University is an important educational institution with an immense economic and cultural impact on central Pennsylvania,” she wrote. “... It is thus undeniable that the public has a significant, legitimate interest in any dispute involving the University, particularly as it relates to students and crimes against them.”
Centre County District Attorney Bernie Cantorna and Prothonotary and Clerk of Courts Jeremy Breon are listed as defendants.
Melewsky — who said completely sealed cases are “extremely unusual and rare” — theorized the university asked Ruest to either require or forbid their offices from taking action.
“I’m just guessing,” Melewsky said. “It’s pure speculation, which is one of the reasons we don’t have completely sealed cases because it means we don’t have a clue about what the court’s doing, what they’ve been asked to do, whether they’re doing it appropriately and the list goes on and on and on.”
The filing was the CDT’s second step in attempting to unseal the documents. An informal June letter asked Ruest to reconsider her decision; she did not respond before Thursday.
A hearing scheduled for July 26 was canceled after Ruest’s latest ruling.
This story was originally published July 14, 2022 at 2:00 PM.