AG nominee Cox faces criticism over grand jury access policies

Attorney General nominee Stephen Cox faced sharp criticism Monday night from citizens who say he is unconstitutionally blocking Alaskans from bringing concerns directly to investigative grand juries.

The House Judiciary Committee heard more than five hours of public testimony on Cox's confirmation. Several speakers alleged Cox commissioned academic research that contradicts his own policies on grand jury access.

Thomas Garver, a 30-year Nikiski resident, told the committee Cox contacted a friend at Notre Dame Law School to co-author an article published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy. Cox now cites that article as the best account of Alaska's grand jury clause, Garver said.

"He contacted his friend, Professor Richard Garnett, at Notre Dame Law School, who then co-authored an academic article published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, which Mr. Cox now cites as the best account we have of the grand jury clause. Professor Garnett did this work, in Mr. Cox's own words, for free," Garver said.

Garver questioned how the chief law enforcement officer should be informing constitutional interpretations. "A personal contact? At no cost, with no competitive process and no public transparency. That is not how the chief law enforcement officer of this state should be informing constitutional interpretations that affect the rights of every Alaskan," he said.

The Harvard article states that neither the executive nor the courts should decide what citizens may bring to grand juries, Garver said. Yet Cox's own framework gives the Attorney General discretion over which citizen requests reach the grand jury, making him a gatekeeper, Garver said.

David Haag, a Soldotna resident, cited the same Notre Dame scholars' report in his testimony. "Neither the executive nor the courts should be permitted to decide what the people may protest about. They may nowhere come between the citizen and the grand juror by screening out petitions," Haag said, quoting from the report.

Haag said Cox's recent formal comments to the Alaska Supreme Court on proposed grand jury rules repeatedly state that citizens must be prohibited from presenting various issues to grand juries, especially court cases. That position contradicts the research Cox himself commissioned, Haag said.

Garver said citizens who sought to speak with Cox directly about grand jury access were turned away. "When citizens sought to speak with Mr. Cox directly about these concerns, Mr. Cox told us, 'I don't take outside meetings in this job,'" Garver said. "Alaskans who have spent years studying this issue, who arrived at his doors before he was even sworn in, have been turned away."

The Alaska Constitution states the investigative power of the grand jury shall never be suspended, Garver noted. "An attorney general who controls the gate, commissions his own supporting scholarship, and does not make himself available to the citizens he serves is not honoring that command. He is undermining it," Garver said.