Attorney General Appoints Special Investigative Team to Check for Sunshine Law Violations
By Tim Hoover, The Kansas City Star, Mo.
Nov. 15–JEFFERSON CITY — Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon today appointed a special investigative team to look into whether Gov. Matt Blunt’s office violated the Sunshine Law by deleting e-mails.
Nixon named former Missouri State Highway Patrol Superintendent Mel Fisher, who worked under Republican Gov. John Ashcroft, to lead the investigation. He also named former Webster County Associate Circuit Judge Daniel Max Knust, a Republican, as special counsel.
It would be Knust’s job to decide whether any violations of law occurred, Nixon said.
“We’ve had a number of allegations we’ve received from whistleblowers, and we’ve also had serious allegations that have appeared in the press,” Nixon said. “It’s clear to me that the ever-wandering and non-consistent nature of responses on any number of issues concerning record retention as well as discussions in public about destruction of records” merited investigation.
Nixon’s appointment was the latest turn of events in the case of Scott Eckersley, a former attorney for Blunt’s office. Eckersley said he was fired in September after giving the administration legal advice that conflicted with its public stance that e-mails were not public records and could be routinely deleted.
The administration has since backed off that stance, but has maintained Eckersley never advised the governor’s office about e-mail retention or the Sunshine Law. Even so, Blunt’s office has filed an ethics complaint against Eckersley for revealing legal secrets.
Nixon, a Democrat running for governor, likely will face Blunt, a Republican, in the 2008 general election.
Blunt’s office has not yet commented on the attorney general’s action.
“This is about the law,” Nixon said. “I don’t want any appearance that this investigation was motivated by any politics.”
He said it was important to find objective, outside investigators to examine what has been going on in Blunt’s office, saying Fisher and Knust’s “independence would be unquestioned.”
“Serious questions have been raised about how and if documents were retained, and if there was compliance with the Sunshine Law,” Fisher said in a statement. “Missourians deserve to know the answers to those questions, and the investigative team will be trying to determine those answers to ensure that the law is upheld.
“In order for this investigation to serve its true purpose, we must conduct it without any influence from outside political interests. That’s exactly what we intend to do.”
Ashcroft appointed Fisher superintendent of the highway patrol in 1989, and Fisher retired in 1993 after 35 years with the law enforcement agency. In 1998, Gov. Mel Carnahan, a Democrat, named Fisher executive director of the Missouri Gaming Commission, and Fisher retired from that position in 2000.
Also Thursday, Nixon named Rick Wilhoit, a retired investigator who worked for the highway patrol for nearly 27 years, to assist Fisher.
To reach Tim Hoover, call 573-634-3565 or send e-mail to thoover@kcstar.com
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