UK violated open records law 3 times in recent cases, AG finds

Attorney General Russell Coleman found the University of Kentucky to be in violation of Kentucky’s open records law in three different cases since August, showing the school’s continuing pattern of problems with the state law aimed at government transparency.

The Lexington Herald-Leader found that in 2025, 18 of 24 appeals to records denied by public universities in Kentucky involved UK. 

The AG’s office published its most recent slate of open records appeals on Wednesday. In two appeals, UK was found to have not violated the law. In addition, the AG’s office found that Kentucky State University had partially violated the law.

In the first case, Professor Reuben Adotorwovor challenged UK over its denial of his request for a tenure and review committee report on him. Although the law permits people to request all documents pertaining to them, the university redacted parts of the report without providing an explanation for doing so. Coleman’s office said UK also violated the Act by failing to respond within five business days of receiving the request.

“When a public agency denies a request for public records, it must also “include a statement of the specific exception authorizing the withholding of the record and a brief explanation of how the exception applies to the record withheld,’” the AG letter said. 

UK officials did not identify what material it redacted or explain the redaction in detail, as required by state law.

The second case involved a request by a person named Samantha Jones, who asked for body camera footage related to the arrest of a student by UK police in 2022.

UK denied the request under the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which is aimed at protecting student privacy. But the AG’s office said protected records under FERPA must be “education records,” and other courts have already ruled that FERPA does not protect law enforcement records. 

“Because the University has not met its burden to show that FERPA applies to the withheld video footage, the University violated the Act when it withheld the video footage on that basis,” the AG opinion said.

FERPA was involved in UK’s most notorious open records loss in 2021, when the student newspaper sued for investigatory records related to the alleged sexual misconduct case of a professor. UK cited FERPA in refusing to turn over the documents. The case, which started in 2016, went to the Kentucky Supreme Court, which ruled unanimously UK had violated the law by using FERPA overbroadly simply because a student might be involved.

“The Open Records Act encourages the ‘free and open examination of public records’ even where examination ‘may cause inconvenience or embarrassment to public officials or others …’ The University may find The Kernel’s (Open Records Act) requests burdensome and intrusive or even ill-advised but the University is not authorized to decide what public records must be disclosed and what records can lawfully be withheld,” Justice Lisabeth Hughes wrote in the opinion.

In the third case, Rabbi Shlomo Litvin was told his request for emails from two UK employees containing the word “Chabad” was too burdensome because it resulted in more than 2,000 documents.

As the courts have noted, “the obvious fact that complying with an open records request will consume both time and manpower is, standing alone, not sufficiently clear and convincing evidence of an unreasonable burden,” the AG opinion said.

UK spokesman Jay Blanton declined to comment on Thursday.

Amye Bensenhaver, a former assistant attorney general and co-founder of the Kentucky Open Government Coalition said UK’s lead counsel, William Thro, has long shown his antipathy to the state open records law.

“Why is UK asserting exemptions that don’t apply? Because they can and they do,” she said. “In his mind the burden rests with the requester – he is responsible for a great deal of harm, and he’s been called out. 

“I just think UK is a very poor student of open government, and learns nothing from its past mistakes, and continues to advance interpretations of the law that have been rejected, including the opinion on FERPA,” she said.

The Kentucky Lantern is in ongoing litigation with the University of Kentucky over another open records case related to a UK professor who protested the dissolution of the faculty senate. The professor left the school as part of a $375,000 agreement; UK refused the Lantern’s request for documents related to the agreement by saying the records were “preliminary,” therefore exempt.

The Attorney General upheld UK’s argument in the appeal; the Lantern has appealed that decision in Fayette Circuit Court.