Judge Quashes Subpoena of UVA Research Records

esocid writes "An Albemarle County Circuit Court judge has set aside a subpoena issued by Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli to the University of Virginia seeking documents related to the work of climate scientist and former university professor Michael Mann. Judge Paul M. Peatross Jr. ruled that Cuccinelli can investigate whether fraud has occurred in university grants, as the attorney general had contended, but ruled that Cuccinelli's subpoena failed to state a 'reason to believe' that Mann had committed fraud. He also set aside the subpoena without prejudice, meaning Cuccinelli can rewrite it to better explain why he wants to investigate, but seemed skeptical about the underlying claim of fraud. The ruling is a major blow for Cuccinelli, a global warming skeptic who had maintained he was investigating whether Mann committed fraud in seeking government money for research that showed the earth has experienced a rapid, recent warming. Mann, now at Penn State University, worked at U-Va. until 2005. 'The Court has read with care those pages and understands the controversy regarding Dr. Mann's work on the issue of global warming. However, it is not clear what he did was misleading, false or fraudulent in obtaining funds from the Commonwealth of Virginia,' Peatross wrote. The ruling also limited Cuccinelli to asking about only one of the five grants issued, which was the only one using state funds."

Comments

Good

[mbone]

If this is not a political prosecution, I don't know what is. As a Virginia taxpayer, I don't mind politicians bloviating, but I don't like them chewing up public resources to do so.

Politics And Science Don't Mix

[WrongSizeGlass]

Cuccinelli is trying to use professor Mann as a political piñata to further his career. I'd shit in my hat if I thought for one second Cuccinelli gave a rat's ass about science (except for how science affects the teaching of evolution in schools).

If a climatologist is the biggest fish on Cuccinelli's radar then he needs to take a closer look at local problems that directly affect his constituents. I'm not saying global warming wouldn't directly affect his constituents ... just that trying to silence a scientist just because he doesn't agree with his findings shouldn't be a top priority for politicians (such as those in Cuccinelli's position).

Cuccinelli is a partisan hack

[Goonie]

It appears that Ken Cuccinelli is a partisan hack who's using his position as Attorney-General primarily to advance right-wing interests, and thus further his own political ambitions.

Last week he was going after abortion clinics.

This week it's Michael Mann.

Yes, very disturbing

[garyisabusyguy]

It comes down to suing researchers out of existance if their results conflict with a political stance

This is beyond scary, it is a sign of America moving from a world leader in research to a has-been backwater

Re:Yes, very disturbing

[dachshund]

If you want to talk scary, that's scary. Mann worked/works for public universities paid for with tax dollars. Explain why getting access to anything that he does while on tax payer time isn't as simple as saying "hey dude, can we see your work?"

Asking to see his work would have amounted to asking for a dump of his published, peer reviewed research papers. They're available without a subpoena. Just because someone works for the public does not mean that they're subject to arbitrary, unjustified investigation at any time, especially when that investigation is expensive and has to be paid for by the public.

And that's all this judge has said: present evidence that this expensive, time consuming investigation is justified, you get your information. Fail to present it, the public will be spared the cost both of the investigation, and the cost of lost research time that the public will have to bear while this individual is investigated for no reason. It's a valuable function, and our government wouldn't survive without it. In a hypothetical world where investigations have no cost, maybe it would be reasonable to allow this to go forward with no justification. We don't live in that world.

I guess that's "scary".

Re:Way to ruin somebody's career.

[garyisabusyguy]

Maybe he can sue reality for not conforming to his imagination

Re:Politics aside

[Ironhandx]

RTFA, it was not a FOIA request. That may have in fact been much more successful. It was a subpoena request for information based on trumped up(invalid) fraud charges. However a FOIA request would have been much less politically advantageous if it went through, which is all that this whole thing was really about, he wasn't looking for evidence he was looking to be able to smear the guys name with the fact that there may have been enough evidence against him to even start a full scale legally backed investigation.

You should be thanking this judge for setting this idiot in his place and not allowing him to abuse the legal system and your tax dollars purely for his own political gain.

It is also still left open for the guy to back up his trumped up fraud charges a little better and resubmit the subpoena request.

Sorry if I'm less than sympathetic towards the guy but his entire career reeks of abuse of power to push nonsensical politically advantageous policies while largely ignoring bigger problems. Global warming and its existence isn't even on my top TEN list of things for politicians to be worrying about.