Judge denies Greitens’ request to throw out Confide lawsuit

A Cole County judge denied two requests from Gov. Eric Greiten’s to dismiss the lawsuit over the use of a secretive texting app by Greitens and his staff.

Circuit Court Judge Jon Beetem said in an order that the allegations relating to sunshine law to proceed, but threw out those relating to records retention laws.

The allegations Beetem allowed include one that claims the governor’s office “conspired to prevent public access to public records by preemptively destroying public records,” according to court documents.

“They’re saying it’s not just that they violated sunshine law, it’s that they planned, in advance, to violate the sunshine law,” said David Roland of the Missouri Center for Freedom and Sunshine law expert. “It’s a very unusual claim. It’ll be interesting to see how the courts will handle it.”

In December, a lawsuit was filed against Greitens by Ben Sansone, who is acting on behalf of the Sunshine Project, after reports that the governor’s office was using the messaging app Confide. Messages sent and received on Confide are automatically deleted, drawing concern from government-transparency advocates.

Greitens’ legal team also filed a motion to halt any discovery, or submission of evidence, in the case. For more on that, click here.