By Michael Martin Garrett
Centre County Common Pleas Judge Jonathan Grine’s lawsuit against the county and a Harrisburg law firm continues to heat up as the parties do battle through dueling court documents.
The latest attack comes from attorney Theodore Tanski and the McShane Law Firm, who accuse Grine of attempting to suppress their right to free speech.
They want the Centre County Court of Common Pleas to lift a court order that prevents the McShane firm from releasing phone records that detail Grine’s phone calls and texts with members of the district attorney’s office between September and November of 2014.
“[Grine’s] arguments seek to have this Court become a censor of thought and expression,” attorneys for Tanski and the McShane firm write in new court documents filed Monday. “…In other words, he wishes to stop inquiry into his office and his practices.”
Grine filed his lawsuit against Centre County, Tanski and the McShane firm last month, after the county released some of his phone records to the McShane firm in response to Right to Know requests. On the same day that Grine filed his suit, he also asked the court to issue an order preventing the McShane firm from releasing the records — a request that the court granted shortly after it was filed.
Grine’s lawsuit is based on several arguments. He claims releasing his phone records is a violation of his privacy, especially because the records include part of his cell phone number. Grine also says the county broke the Right to Know law because the law doesn’t allow the release of telephone numbers. He also claims that the county had no authority to release judicial records, although the county has argued that the records are public financial information because the phones were provided by the county.
But for Tanski and the McShane firm, Grine’s lawsuit ultimately boils down to a question of constitutional rights. They claim that because the records were obtained lawfully, it is a “prior restraint” of the law firm’s First Amendment right to free speech to prevent the release of the records.
In their latest filing, attorneys for the McShane firm quote from a number of U.S. Supreme Court cases that found court orders limiting speech to be First Amendment violations. They also argue that because Grine is a publicly-elected official, he has a much lower right to privacy than an ordinary person.
“[Grine’s] role in the community renders him inextricably bound to the public,” the filling reads. “…Therefore, he is accountable to the public.”
The McShane firm also thinks the records are a matter of public concern, arguing that is why they should be released. Attorneys for the firm point out that judges are required to avoid “even ‘the appearance of impropriety,’ not just actual impropriety” and that the records have been the subject of intense attention from the public and local media.
Magisterial District Judge Kelley Gillette-Walker and Centre County District Attorney Stacy Parks Miller have filed very similar lawsuits against the county.
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