Spokane union fights public release of firehouse sex files

SPOKANE — The city's firefighters union is trying to block the public release of city documents detailing the case against a firefighter who quit after admitting on-duty sex with a teenage girl and photographing the encounter.

Firefighters Local 29, which represents the city's 290 firefighters, got a temporary court order Thursday blocking the city attorney's office from releasing documents about former firefighter Daniel W. Ross.

The Spokesman-Review newspaper had sought release of the documents under the state's Open Records Act.

"The information sought by the public disclosure request will violate Dan Ross' right to privacy" and would be "offensive and embarrassing," Christian Phelps, an attorney representing Ross and the union, said in court filings.

The newspaper filed legal papers Friday stating there's no legal reason why the documents should not be released.

A hearing before Superior Court Judge Harold D. Clarke III is scheduled for Tuesday.

The union took the legal action after sending the mayor a letter threatening an unfair-labor-practices complaint if the city released the records.

If the file is released, it "will effectively put a wet blanket on any future discipline hearings," union President Greg Borg said. "My members will be reluctant to answer questions, knowing their answers will be in the newspaper."

Newspaper attorneys Duane Swinton and Tracy LeRoy said in court papers that the union "has not demonstrated that it is named in the public records at issue or that the records pertain to the union," and therefore lacks legal standing.

They said the records do not constitute "personal information" that otherwise would be exempt from disclosure.

The newspaper formally requested the records Feb. 14, about two weeks before publishing a story naming Ross.