Utah Court of Appeals · No. 20240561-CA

Utah Attorney General’s Office v. Knox

Withdrawn Judicial review

Forum: Utah Court of Appeals
Case number: No. 20240561-CA
Decided: Nov 18, 2024
Outcome: Withdrawn
Underlying case: Closed. Dismissed with prejudice by stipulation on November 18, 2024. District court No. 230904641, Third District, Judge Patrick Corum.
Relief: None. The appeal was dismissed by stipulation and each side bore its own costs and fees.
Requests at issue: Attorney General Sean Reyes’s daily calendar, August 2022 onward, requested by Annie Knox of KSL
Conduct at issue: A records request for the Attorney General’s calendar, denied on the ground that a daily calendar is not a record under GRAMA
Underlying claims: Petition for judicial review of a State Records Committee decision under Utah Code 63G-2-404

What the court held

Nothing was decided on appeal. The office argued that a daily calendar is not a record at all under the personal-use exemption, and no appellate court has ruled on that question.
The district court ruling stands. It affirmed the committee, ordered the calendar released, and awarded the reporter her fees. A district court ruling binds the parties and nobody else.
The dismissal order says in terms that it is not a resolution in either party's favour, so neither side can cite this as a win. The office appealed a fee award and left paying its own.
One other records appeal was waiting on this case. Appeal 2024-094, a Salt Lake Tribune request for the Salt Lake City mayor's calendar, sat 469 days in abeyance and was withdrawn without a hearing.