Judge Cochran responds to Kelley's Lawsuit

Newton, TX – Newton County Judge Ronnie Cochran provided ETB with correspondence emails concerning a lawsuit that was filed against the county by Newton County citizen David Kelley last year.

The basis of Kelley’s lawsuit involves a Freedom of Information Request(FOIR) that Kelley sent to Judge Cochran’s office on November 11, 2023, at 9:21AM. Kelley requested the following information: “All checks, statements, wires, transfers, deposits, loans and grants starting from January 1, 2018, through December 31, 2022.”

At that time Newton County had no official amount to be charged concerning FOIR. The county implemented a new policy in February 2024 regarding FOIR requests as follows: The first 8 hours is at no cost and each additional hour to be charged at a $15 per hour rate.

Judge Cochran released this statement along with emails from the county to Mr. Kelley: "My response to the misinformation and misrepresentation of the facts concerning Mr. Kelley's lawsuit against the county, over a public information request. The following emails show that Mr. Kelley was informed up front that due to the large amount of employee time and volume of information, that there could be possible charges and he could then choose how to proceed. When he was informed about the $1360 and asked how he wanted to proceed, Mr. Kelley never responded. After the allotted time with no response, either 30 or 60 days according to state law, the information request became no longer valid. Mr. Kelley is a patriot and feels like he is fighting for the people but with others misrepresenting the facts, it is creating a potentially dangerous situation for those involved. In today's politically charged world, keyboard warriors without all of the facts, have the potential to incite and enrage well meaning citizens. We have already had a few officials verbally accosted over this situation and I hope we can continue in peace moving forward. I have stated this from the beginning, hands down the county would win in court but we would never win the court of public opinion. When the suit was filed, the District Attorney's office and attorney's were named in the suit, so it was deemed a conflict of interest if they were to represent the county. The county has followed its procedures regarding public information requests and will continue to follow procedures and laws in the future."