Illegal destruction of official e-mail records -- increasingly a problem in the Digital Age -- isn’t something that’s usually admitted in a press intervienSansw. But it happened in Lexington when a local publication filed FOI requests for Dave Kleppinger’s e-mails. Kleppinger isive director of the Rockbridge Area Economic Development Commission.

Doug Harwood reported in The Advocate that Kleppinger acknowledged “destroying records concerning his dealing with a group attempting to privatize the Virginia Horse Center in order to keep the public – and this publication in particular – from obtaining them under the Freedom of Information Act.”

Harwood quoted Kleppinger as saying, “My understanding is that I shouldn ’t be doing what I’m doing.”

However, the local commonwealth’s attorney said there was insufficient evidence of criminal intent to support a misdemeanor charge of destruction of public records.

“Our economic development director says it was to maintain confidentiality,” Harwood wrote. “It also kept him from complying with FOI requests. ”