News urges Utah justices to make report public

An attorney for the Deseret Morning News told the Utah Supreme Court that the public has a right to review a Salt Lake County sexual harassment report to make sure the investigation was free from political influence.

During oral arguments Friday, attorneys for the paper and the county argued their case before the state's highest court over whether the results of a sexual harassment investigation involving a high-ranking county official should be made public.

Attorney Jeffrey Hunt argued that the public has a right to review the county's investigation to make sure that politics did not play a role, as the Salt Lake County District Attorney's Office claims it did not.

Hunt said under Utah's Government Records Access and Management Act, or GRAMA, all government records are presumed public unless specifically designated private or protected under some 50 exceptions under the law. This specific report, Hunt argued, concerned misconduct by a government official while in his official capacity. The victim of the sexual harassment already had waived her privacy interest in the report.

The independent report was commissioned by the district attorney's office after a former county clerk's office employee, Marcia Rice, sued Chief Deputy Clerk Nick Floros for sexual harassment in 2003. Rice also alleged that Salt Lake County Clerk Sherrie Swensen knew of the situation but did nothing. Members of the County Council also accused former District Attorney David Yocom of soft-pedaling the investigation to allow Floros to retire, and he declined to criminally charge him.

Rice's suit eventually was settled out of court, and Floros resigned and then retired from his job before the independent report was completed.

The Deseret Morning News filed an open records request to obtain a copy of the report but was denied by the county. The paper then appealed through three different levels of county government, only to be rejected and forced to appeal the case to a district court judge.

In April 2006, 3rd District Judge Tyrone Medley ruled the report should be designated private out of concern for the sexual harassment perpetrator's privacy. The paper appealed the decision to the Utah Supreme Court.

In his ruling, Medley said releasing the report would have a chilling effect on government employees from coming forward and complaining about harassment.

Hunt, however, pointed out to justices that the victim's identity was known when she sued the county and that legal statements show that at least two witnesses in the case said they assumed the details of the investigation would be made public sooner or later.