kicker22
Well-Known Member
Does it really matter when the info was released? This is OSU were talking about...the same school that released the report after the press conference.
Whoops, no...this is a WOW.... New texts and info in Ohio St Problems
- Thread starter EstronHawkKing
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Does it really matter when the info was released? This is OSU were talking about...the same school that released the report after the press conference.
NoBeer
Well-Known Member
What still has me scratching my head is what Deace pointed out on the podcast, that OSU is releasing all this super damning information but didn't do more. It would not have surprise me to learn way down the road that they hid a bunch of evidence but god if they are still hiding stuff and releasing this then holy crap. So I don't think they're burying anything but this looks like a fire-able offense.
Also, destroying records (text messages) is unquestionably illegal.
Also, destroying records (text messages) is unquestionably illegal.
okeefe4prez
Well-Known Member
Is it if they are on personal phones and there is no litigation hold? Or were these on public owned phones that were subject to FOIA and data retention policies?
Anyway, thing about texts is that they don't really all get deleted. My buddy's wife always deleted her texts "to save storage space." One month my buddy went to submit his phone bill for expense reimbursement and was surprised to see a 60 page bill that was text after text to and from his wife's number. She trickle truthed him. "Oh, those three numbers are just friends." Next day "well, they're guys but we're just friends." Next day, "yeah, well we sexted a little." Next day, "well, we met up at the Wendy's on Route 59 but we just held hands." My buddy paid $100 for some computer program that is a skinnied down version of a metadata tool the FBI uses to recover deleted texts from iPhones and he got to the bottom of it real fast once he went through the deleted texts. The divorce cost him a lot, but now he has a 25 year old girlfriend who is hot.
SteveGarvey1
Well-Known Member
If US government officials can destroy emails and hard drives and have nothing happen to them then likely there's nothing to see here.
NoBeer
Well-Known Member
Two different questions. For the record, while I'm not an expert on records retention for government funded universities, I do have two roles in my professional life.... one is operational risk management and the other is records management.
If the messages are on a personal device it is not illegal to destroy them. BUT, the university should have and enforce a policy that university business should not be conducted on personal devices. Its probably not as regulated in that space. I work in financial services and if you are conducting business with a client on a personal device and get caught, you're fired 100% of the time because you just put the firm in a regulatory non-compliance position.
For legal holds, it is irrelevant. Legal holds are to retain records that you OTHERWISE could destroy. So say I have 10 year old account statements for a client. I can destroy those because they're older than 7 years. UNLESS that client is suing us... then I can't. So regular retention requirements apply and then legal holds trump expiration of records.
*I am not a lawyer and I do not have specific expertise in government/university records management.
The entire second part of your post is an excellent question. I think the committee owes the public an explanation. Did they try to recover the texts and were unable to or did they simply not even try. Could the cellular carrier provide copies?
okeefe4prez
Well-Known Member
Well, if I were a guy like Urban I would run two phones for sure. And this is arguably something where Urban could say "we're all in a friend circle so this wasn't circumventing the rule." I'm pretty sure the big schools want their official business run on a school phone for compliance reasons, particularly for recruiting purposes. But if Urban and his friends are just talking, that's gonna be a grey area.
I can't imagine he would have had a litigation hold since to my knowledge there is no suit pending, so if it was on a personal device and he's in that grey area, he's fine.
The bottom line is OSU has demonstrated no desire to fire him. If they had a desire to fire him, they would have taken significant measures to document improprieties around deleting the texts and conjured up a reason to create "Cause" under his contract to avoid a buyout. But if they don't want to fire him, no sense in actually undertaking a full blown investigation because willful ignorance is far better than burying actual knowledge of something bad.
NoBeer
Well-Known Member
That's not how it works at all. You can be friends with your subordinates but if one of your mutual friends or a partner reports something to you, you have an obligation to treat it as a work related report. You can't hide behind "we are also friends". I don't know if you manage people but try that and see how short your career is.
okeefe4prez
Well-Known Member
Yeah, you can't hide behind that, but here's the problem, but your initial point was that it's illegal to delete text messages. I'm saying I doubt that it is and there might be a grey area in the rule that requires use of the work phone. So to make it an avenue to nail Urban is going to be tough, especially since the school ain't interested in nailing him.
NoBeer
Well-Known Member
Yeah, its not an avenue because they clearly have NO desire to nail him. I was speaking more theoretically.
