“Every person in Connecticut benefits from the Freedom of Information Act, even the ones who resist it. For the past 35 years, Colleen Murphy has been in the front ranks of protecting our right to know, many of those years as the shrewd general of the ragtag good government army. Colleen retires this month as the executive director and general counsel of the Freedom of Information Commission, hanging up her battle gear.”
03/07/2026
Kevine Rennie, Hartford Courant
The revolting legacy of the pedophile trafficker Jeffrey Epstein continues to unmask the obstacles to finding truth.
Friday brought the release of more documents in the possession of the Department of Justice. The resistance to public disclosure has been wickedly unrelenting, overcome only by an act of Congress last year.
The Epstein saga holds many lessons. How hard it is for a victim of crime to be believed when the perpetrator is rich and connected is the most obvious. The battle over millions of Epstein documents is a common one magnified: the intractable resistance to allowing the public to see how the people’s business is conducted.
In 1975, Ella Grasso in her first year as governor, championed the passage of the nation’s most comprehensive Freedom of Information Act. It became a model for other states in a reforming mood after the Watergate scandal and, later, for emerging democracies around the world. As others near and far looked upon Connecticut’s commitment to open government, a decades long struggle began and continues here in the Constitution State to sustain the law that served as a beacon for millions.
In Connecticut, officials in local governments, state agencies, and the legislature never tire of inventing subtle and blunt methods to undermine your right to see how policies are adopted or strangled, decisions are made or avoided, people promoted or fired, and money spent.