Notre Dame Defeats ESPN

A decision issued yesterday by the Indiana Supreme Court

An ESPN reporter requested information from the Notre Dame Security Police Department regarding 275 student-athletes. The Department declined, claiming that Notre Dame is a private university and its police force is not a “law enforcement agency” subject to Indiana’s Access to Public Records Act. The trial court agreed, and dismissed ESPN’s suit. We too find that a private university police department is not a “public agency” for the purposes of APRA, and affirm the trial court…

We acknowledge the importance of an open government, as well as the broad access granted to government records by APRA. See Ind. Code § 5-14-3-1. However, the job of this Court is to interpret, not legislate, the statutes before it. Under APRA as it is currently written, the Department is not a “public agency” under any of the three subsections identified.

(Mike Frisch)