Transparency News, 4/22/2022

 

Friday
April 22, 2022

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state & local news stories

 

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Judge Adrianne Bennett — the former parole board chairwoman at the center of a scandal — challenged the constitutional authority of a state commission to suspend her from the bench last year, according to records unsealed Thursday by the Supreme Court of Virginia. The court denied her request the next day. The records were unsealed at the request of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, which made a filing with the court in July asking the court to unseal its sealing order. The court’s 4-2 Thursday decision addressed the sealing order and all the records, and the court unsealed some of the records and provided them to the newspaper. But it left key records under seal. The court’s opinion said that “in the interest of openness and transparency, we further unseal the remainder of the case” with the exception of attachments filed by Bennett. Bennett’s filing at the Supreme Court — called a mandamus petition — was against the members of JIRC and its general counsel, Raymond Morrogh, according to the records the court unsealed on Thursday. She challenged their constitutional authority to suspend her.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Read the opinion on VCOG's website
Read VCOG's tweet highlighting some of the points
In a 4-2 opinion, the Supreme Court of Virginia refused to unseal judicial disciplinary records detailing why a Virginia Beach judge was suspended from the bench amid controversy over her past tenure as chair of the Virginia Parole Board. Though the court agreed to unseal legal filings in the case, a majority of the justices concluded the JIRC records themselves should remain under seal to protect the disciplinary process for judges. Bennett herself attached those records to a filing in the Supreme Court, but the majority said that wasn’t enough to nullify the confidentiality of JIRC proceedings. In a strongly worded dissent, Justices D. Arthur Kelsey and Teresa M. Chafin argued the majority opinion cuts against the principle that court business should be open to the public. The secrecy surrounding the process has made it difficult to determine whether the JIRC proceedings against Bennett were connected to the allegations of misconduct by the Parole Board she led. The Times-Dispatch reported last year that Bennett was on “extended leave.” Proceedings that lead to a formal complaint being filed with the Supreme Court are supposed to be open under state law, a fact the dissenting justices noted. That law says “the record of any proceeding filed with the Supreme Court shall lose its confidential character.”
Virginia Mercury

Michael McDermott is locked in a legal battle with the state of Virginia in his quest to publish overdose response incidents and shed light on the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of state programs battling drug addiction.  His efforts, he says, will save lives. Transparency will reveal which programs fail. Armed with that knowledge, the state can direct money toward more effective recovery programs. In 2021, McDermott requested the newest data; the state was uncooperative and promised the data at a later date. But the data never came. The state said it was migrating the information from one system to another.  “The data still exists,” says McDermott, arguing that tweaks to systems shouldn’t prevent the release of information.  “It’s a shame that, as an advocate, my bandwidth has to be squandered because people just aren’t doing the right thing,” he says. “It’s public data.”  The lack of data delays McDermott and FAVOR’s ability to evaluate state recovery programs, putting those in recovery programs at risk if the ineffectiveness trend continues. Recognizing that the withholding of data was a FOIA violation, McDermott filed suit. McDermott connected with Megan Rhyne of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government (VCOG) to gain traction in the press and to learn more about the state’s freedom of information law.  Rhyne touts McDermott’s persistence in raising awareness about his case.  Rhyne and VCOG “use all of their tools to give citizens the confidence to challenge anybody who stands in the way of what they rightfully have by statute,” Rhyne says. Although the coalition does not intervene in individual cases, Rhyne helps McDermott navigate the dense law and publicizes the case through press contacts, drawing attention to McDermott’s research and advocacy. 
NFOIC
NOTE: McDermott's hearing is scheduled for today

The City of Bristol, Virginia has produced documents regarding findings on the city’s landfill and sent them to the City of Bristol, Tennessee. A statement issued by Danielle Smith, the city attorney for Bristol, Tennessee, says that the documents were provided after a hearing, during which the court ordered some documents be made available by Thursday. The court also ordered that the remaining documents be provided to Bristol, Tenn. by May 25. Smith stated that the documents provided Thursday are “being reviewed to determine whether Bristol Virginia has complied.”
WJHL

After four years in federal prison and nearly two years under home confinement, ex-Norfolk Treasurer and Councilman Anthony Burfoot is free. And he is once again appealing the corruption conviction that landed him in prison in 2017. A federal jury convicted Burfoot on four charges involving public corruption and two counts of perjury in 2016. Prosecutors argued Burfoot took more than $464,000 in bribes from developers in exchange for votes and other benefits while he served on the council. Burfoot, who has denied any wrongdoing, is appealing the conviction for a second time after being denied by a federal court in 2018. He filed a new, 172-page appeal in June 2021 requesting his conviction either be vacated or that he be given a new trial and is awaiting a response from the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. In the appeal, Burfoot claims his defense attorney during the five-week trial, Andrew Sacks, provided ineffective counsel, and that prosecutors made misleading and inaccurate statements during the 2016 trial that went unchallenged by Sacks. 
The Virginian-Pilot

Cemeteries are essential guides to the past, documenting ancestries and settlement patterns, but in Fairfax County, hundreds of sites risk being lost to time themselves, with some even unmarked or abandoned. To prevent that, the county has undertaken a massive archaeological initiative to create a map of their locations to preserve history, provide information for development and more. The county will also create a manual for how to care for cemeteries, according to an announcement on April 14 launching the survey.
FFXnow

In a push to convince Fairfax County to fund the arts, one high school student put on a show. The performance on April 13 provided a musical interlude after hours of in-person, phone, and video remarks across three days of budget hearings before the Board of Supervisors. Student Christopher Tate, who attends Washington-Liberty High School in Arlington, only shared his name and spoke about himself when asked by the board after his performance, which drew applause. In addition to Tate’s performance, ArtsFairfax enlisted outgoing Fairfax County Poet Laureate Nicole Tong, the first person to hold that position, for a poem reading as part of its plea to the board.
FFXnow
 

stories of national interest

John Kerry burned rubber as he swiftly exited a climate discussion at MIT avoiding a Herald reporter’s question about his lack of transparency. The climate envoy sprinted to a waiting elevator, surrounded by bodyguards, before the Herald could ask him about its overdue Freedom of Information Act request about his still-secret office. Kerry and MIT president Rafael Reif, who moderated Kerry’s talk Thursday, gave an exclusive interview to Bloomberg Baystate Business Hour, but otherwise did not speak to any members of the media to the Herald’s knowledge. As the Herald has previously reported, Kerry’s office has refused to share a roster of its climate staff and its payroll until October 2024, in response to a Herald records request filed almost a year ago.
Boston Herald

 

 

 

 

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