Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli’s case seeking records on climatologist Michael Mann is headed before the full state Supreme Court – eventually.
The state’s highest court granted Cuccinelli’s appeal arguing that a circuit court erred in setting aside the attorney general’s demands for records under the state’s Fraud Against Taxpayers Act last year.
Albemarle County Circuit Court Judge Paul M. Peatross set aside the civil investigative demands, akin to a subpoena, on the grounds that Cuccinelli provided no “objective basis” that Mann, the creator of the infamous “hockey stick” graph charting a spike in global temperatures, defrauded taxpayers by obtaining research grants.
Cuccinelli, a global warming skeptic, wants the university to turn over e-mails and documents related to Mann, now a professor at Penn State University. UVa., meanwhile, has maintained that the investigation threatens academic freedom.
“We are pleased that the court has granted our appeal,” Cuccinelli spokesman Brian Gottstein wrote in an email. “We look forward to fully briefing the case and arguing it before the full court.”
Cuccinelli is also re-filing another demand for the documents in response to Peatross’s ruling.
