UPDATED with statement from St. Louis circuit attorney.
ST. LOUIS — Circuit Attorney Kimberly M. Gardner must release records that reveal how her office is spending tax dollars on legal and professional services, a St. Louis judge ruled Monday.
Circuit Judge Joan Moriarty ruled in favor of the Post-Dispatch in a 2019 lawsuit challenging the Circuit Attorney’s Office’s refusal to release copies of contracts it entered with law firms and third-party vendors.
Moriarty’s order Monday said Gardner’s office “cannot show compliance with the statute in withholding any of the requested records, or in untimely asserting a permissive exemption to the requests.”
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A spokeswoman for Gardner provided a statement Monday asserting that the Circuit Attorney’s Office has provided “the available requested documents as we do with all requests to our office.” The statement also said the office is working with the courts “and opposing counsel to resolve this matter, while continuing to serve the people of the city of St. Louis. This is ongoing litigation and as such we cannot comment further.”
Since the lawsuit was filed, Gardner’s office has provided the Post-Dispatch some of the documents, including some with redactions, but has refused to disclose others.
The newspaper’s lawyer, Joseph Martineau of Lewis Rice, filed the suit in August alleging Sunshine Law violations after Gardner’s office rejected the paper’s requests for contracts since Jan. 1, 2017, Gardner’s first day in office. The newspaper requested copies of agreements to pay law firms, consultants and community activists for services. The office’s then-custodian of records said “records related to legal actions, causes of action or litigation involving a public governmental body” were closed.
Some of those contractors have been working for the Circuit Attorney’s Office during a grand jury investigation into her office and a private investigator indicted last year on charges of perjury and evidence tampering. Gardner’s office has previously released contracts and invoices to the Post-Dispatch related to the 2018 investigation of then-Gov. Eric Greitens.
The Sunshine Law, Missouri’s open records law, requires governments to respond to requests for access to public records within three days. The law requires that its exemptions from disclosing public records must be “strictly construed” to promote a public policy of openness.
Gardner is a defendant in a pending lawsuit filed by Charles Lane of St. Louis, who alleged last year that Gardner’s contracts with at least nine private attorneys are invalid and that her office can’t spend public money on them as a result.