by Larry O’Dell
Associated Press
RICHMOND, Virginia — The Virginia Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a conservative group’s attempt to obtain a University of Virginia climate researcher’s emails…
David W. Schnare, the institute’s lawyer, said the court mischaracterized the organization’s position. He said the institute agreed that the university could protect records whose release would harm its competitive advantage in the marketplace of ideas, but argued that the emails it sought simply did not fit that description.
Schnare said in a statement that the court “accepted U.Va.’s unsubstantiated fears that release of the emails would significantly chill intellectual debate and on that basis allowed U.Va. to continue to operate under a veil of secrecy that the citizens may not penetrate.”
