Mayor Scott’s team makes new claims against OIG, requests jury trial in records fight

BALTIMORE (WBFF) — The fight between Mayor Brandon Scott’s administration and Baltimore’s independent watchdog isn’t ending anytime soon as more filings reveal an escalating tension and now a request for a jury trial.

The Scott administration filed three different documents with the court Aug. 31 amid the ongoing battle with Inspector General Isabel Cumming over the Office of Inspector General’s access to City records and its authority to enforce subpoenas.

In one filing, the Scott Administration offered new information to the court as Judge Pamela White considered the OIG’s pending motion for summary judgment. The city submitted a chart outlining OIG requests to various agencies.

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City Solicitor Ebony Thompson, and other attorneys within the Law Department, characterized some of those efforts as attempts to cooperate with the OIG, while limiting what they called “wasteful requests by the OIG unrelated to any legitimate OIG investigation.”

The chart filed by the City lists OIG requests involving email accounts, OneDrive files, computer images and other records. The City claims the requests total more than 2.1 million emails, equating to more than one terabyte of data.

In March, City Law Department Chief Solicitor Hilary Ruley told Cumming she could not meet deadlines for subpoenas seeking 28 people’s email accounts over several years. Ruley asked Cumming for keywords that could narrow the records being collected.

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Cumming declined, saying keyword searches could be unreliable and telling Ruley, “What is needed for the OIG investigation is in the subpoena. We do not share details of our confidential investigations. Please comply.”

The dispute is part of the larger legal question at the heart of the case, whether the Maryland Public Information Act, or MPIA, limit what the OIG can obtain through its subpoena authority.

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The City maintains that MPIA protections still apply when it turns records over to the OIG, including protections for attorney-client communications, personnel information and other confidential records.

The OIG has argued its subpoenas are fundamentally different from public records requests made under the MPIA. In court filings, Cumming’s attorneys have argued the OIG is not an “applicant” requesting public records but an independent watchdog exercising subpoena powers granted through the City Charter.

The OIG has argued those subpoenas are “legal orders compelling attendance and production of evidence” and that applying MPIA restrictions to them would interfere with the office’s ability to investigate fraud, waste and abuse in City government.

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Judge Pamela White rejected a central part of that argument in August, ruling that the OIG’s jurisdiction, including issuing and enforcing subpoenas, “is not in conflict with or restricted by the MPIA.”

She concluded OIG subpoenas are not simply public-record requests governed by MPIA restrictions.

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The City has appealed and is now asking the Appellate Court of Maryland to pause White’s order while that appeal proceeds.

Meanwhile, the Aug. 31 filing includes documents the City says demonstrates why unrestricted OIG access presents concerns.

One exhibit contains a June 2025 exchange involving then-Chief Administrative Officer Faith Leach after she discovered an OIG employee had access to one of her documents. Cumming initially told Leach there was no error, and the access “was part of an investigation.”

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A later email from Leach said she had been told the broad access was caused by a system glitch; Cumming subsequently wrote that the glitch had been fixed, according to the filings.

The City characterizes the episode as OIG access to private, deliberative budget documents unrelated to an investigation.

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The City has maintained Judge White’s Aug. 14 ruling ordering the city to turn over outstanding data requests to the OIG amounts to an “illegal preliminary injunction” and said by doing so, the city would be required to turn over “millions of pages of public records” without protecting privileged, private and confidential information.

While Judge White has repeatedly rejected the city’s argument that Cumming doesn’t have the authority to sue, Mayor Scott’s legal team continues to argue Baltimore’s charter does not give the OIG the independent “right to be sue or be sued.”

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In the new court documents, Mayor Scott’s legal team denies many of the allegations outlined in the OIG lawsuit, raises 11 different defenses, and ends one filing with a clear request: “The Defendant demands a jury trial.”

Judge White has scheduled a Sept. 16 hearing on the OIG’s motion for summary judgment.

Follow Political Reporter Mikenzie Frost on X and Facebook. Send tips to mbfrost@sbgtv.com.