He said the trial court impermissibly shifted the burden of proof to the governor and the lt. governor.
“This was error, and this is clear when one examines the statute,” he said, citing the 1 CMC § 9918 (a) which provides that certain documents are exempt from public inspection and copying.
“The burden of proof is always on the government to establish that the disputed documents were withheld in accordance with the exemptions that prohibit disclosure. Thus, unless the requested record falls within a specific exemption of the OGA the agency must produce the record,” Huesman said in documents he filed at the Supreme Court last Friday.
He added that the trial court ignored established case law that protects billing documents from public record disclosure, and thirdly, the trial court relied on case law that was not analogous to the case at bar.
“There is only one case on point, and the trial court ignored it in favor of cases that are not analogous,” he said.
On June, Associate Judge David A. Wiseman ordered the governor and the lt. governor to produce, within 48 hours, 30 various documents, which include contracts and source of funds for the anti-federalization lawsuit.
Huesman said there’s no case the government knew, and the trial court or Sablan could cite, which disproved the idea that the documents she is seeking are not only exempt but that disclosure would harm the government’s litigation efforts.
“The only court that has ever ordered these types of documents released during active litigation is the Commonwealth Superior Court through the trial court’s order,” he said, in his appeal dated July 17, 2009.
On July 10, 2009, Sablan asked the superior court to affirm the judgment of the trial court in ordering the release of records.
She said the trial court did not improperly shift the burden of proof onto the governor and lt. governor, and the trial court did not erroneously ignore analogous case law.
