Arlington Circuit Court Judge Paul Sheridan ignores the facts and law, and renders an embarrassing decision. [Washington Post]
Arlington Circuit Court Judge Paul Sheridan ignores the facts and law, and renders an embarrassing decision. [Washington Post]
[test posting – ignore this]
Having once been a lawyer and now happily engaged in friendlier pursuits, I’d like to cast a bit of light on this. First off, it’s not really a win or lose for anyone. I actually like the judge’s approach, and the fact that he’s retired. Not being a sitting judge, he need not worry about a blow to his stature that a reversal on appeal would entail. Having long been on the bench, he knows how to make a good, complete record that will ensure the appellate court is supplied with sufficient raw material to make a decision. As opposed to simply remanding for more hearings and re-booting the process.
I’d like to courteously disagree with Shawn. The exception to FOIA we’re dealing with is poorly written. If you take out the legalese and the grammatical flourishes, the law says, literally, ‘data that has not been publicly released is not required to be released’. That, of course, is nonsensical, and the appellate court will have to make sense of it. Believe it or not, it’s true — lots of cases with a problem like that are won and lost on issues dealing with issues like, as Bill Clinton famously observed, “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.”
Bottom line: it’s not a loss for ATI, and if Mann is gloating, he’s either misled or self-deceiving. Stay tuned, the real decision is yet to come.
Shawn, do you have a reference for that?
Now, Shawn’s case is compelling, Milloy. Do you have a counterpoint?
Even without this court ruling, Mann’s refusal to release his data for full review for public perusal would invalidate it’s use. The judge has merely embossed his refusal with a legalistic patina. This isn’t the final legal word either.
Well, much as I dislike Mann, the law seems pretty straightforward (if wrong in itself) and thus the judge was correct.
“Data, records or information of a proprietary nature produced or collected by or for faculty or staff of public institutions of higher education, other than the institutions’ financial or administrative records, in the conduct of or as a result of study or research on medical, scientific, technical or scholarly issues, whether sponsored by the institution alone or in conjunction with a governmental body or a private concern, where such data, records or information has not been publicly released, published, copyrighted or patented.”
Ref ” this is no longer a valid part of the scientific record”: Was ‘this’ data or just emails? Perhaps it never was presented as part of the scientific record. Of course, Mann hides the actual data when he can, as well…
So Mann has a right to withhold his data “without time limit”?. Sorry, this is no longer a valid part of the scientific record, even if it’s legal. If it can’t be validated by third parties, it isn’t valid.
Reblogged this on Climate Ponderings.