Manweller v. CWU

This morning I took the opportunity to go to a hearing to determine the fate of public records requests by the Yakima Herald Republic and the Ellensburg Daily Record. The records -- or, record, singular -- relates to an investigation by CWU of Professor Manweller after a sexual harassment complaint by a female student in 2006.

Before I go on, it's worth noting that this subject is timely: just the other day the New York Times did a major article on how poorly colleges perform when asked to investigate sexual misconduct against female students.

I had only read about this local matter in the local newspapers, but as discussed in court here's apparently what happened: late in the summer someone suggested to one or both newspapers that they might be interested in something that happened to Professor Manweller at his institution in 2006. The papers contacted CWU, CWU looked at their records and discovered that they had not done a proper/formal investigation in 2006. So CWU carried out, six years later, an investigation and found that there was not enough evidence of wrongdoing.¹

Neither of the attorneys at the hearing disputed the facts in the previous paragraph, but Professor Manweller has been working to see that the record of the belated investigation not be released -- hence his request for a temporary restraining order (TRO), which had been granted and was the subject of today's hearing.

As near as I could tell, Professor Manweller's attorney argued to continue the TRO on these grounds:

1. The law (an RCW or WAC whose citation I didn't catch) clearly states that a request for public records has to be made using the form provided by the agency to which the request is directed. Because the newspapers didn't use the form, no public records request had been made, and there was nothing further to discuss.²
2. The investigation was politically motivated.
3. Although the investigation found no wrongdoing, it does contain details, hearsay, and [my word here:] sordidness, so it should not be released.

CWU's attorney, from the state Attorney General's office, noted that

1. CWU doesn't particularly want to release the record, because it will not cast CWU in a good light.³ However, CWU has been asked for it, and has a responsibility to release it.
2. The lack of use of the proper form isn't a serious problem, since in practice forms are routinely not required (Judge Sparks agreed, noting that citizens should be helped to get, not hindered from getting, public documents).
3. The key argument was this: this court doesn't have jurisdiction over public records requests, but the plaintiff (Manweller) brought the case here because he'd knew he'd lose in the proper court.
4. Further, while not proceeding as appropriate under the Public Records Act, the plaintiff is trying to invoke the Public Records Act.

After talking about how important public records -- and also privacy -- are, Judge Sparks said he understood Manweller's motivation of block release. He said that he trusts the newspapers to act with discretion, as they do every day in their work. Judge Sparks ordered that the TRO be dissolved, and said CWU could proceed to release the results of the investigation with the name of the student redacted.

¹If memory serves, none of the administrators (Dean of the College of the Sciences, Provost, President) in the appropriate chain of command are still at CWU, so the present administrators inherited this one. ²You can't make this stuff up. As I listened I wondered whether Manweller really wanted to win on such a flimsy technicality. ³Again, see the NYT article on how poorly these things are handled, even at fancy schools like Amherst. The NYT article is mostly about student-on-student misconduct. Imagine how a lesser college might handle a complaint against a pugnacious, outspoken, politically problematic tenured faculty member.