Kentucky Attorney General Andy Beshear has joined a lawsuit between Western Kentucky University and its student newspaper, the College Heights Herald, over an open records request into the university’s sexual misconduct investigations.

“The Herald intends to litigate this case vigorously,” said Michael Abate, an attorney with Louisville-based Kaplan and Partners representing the Herald.

Beshear’s right to intervene in the case was set to be tested in Warren Circuit Court on Monday morning during a hearing presided over by Judge Steve Wilson. However, that hearing was canceled after all the parties, including WKU, agreed to let Beshear join the case.

Deborah Wilkins, the university’s attorney, declined to comment on the hearing but sent the Daily News an order granting Beshear’s right to intervene.

“Although Western Kentucky University (‘WKU’) does not agree with the Attorney General’s assertions in the Motion to Intervene, WKU does agree that the Attorney General has a right to intervene and does not object to Attorney General’s Motion to Intervene,” the order said.

The order was signed by attorneys representing WKU, the Herald and the Kentucky Kernel, the University of Kentucky’s student newspaper, which is also a party in a similar open records request.

WKU denied records to a student reporter with the Herald who requested records into all sexual misconduct allegations over a five-year period and denied a similar request from a student reporter with the Kernel.

WKU also denied access to the records when Beshear asked to review them confidentially in response to appeals from both of the students.

Following that, in January, Beshear found WKU in violation of the Open Records Act.

When it denied the Herald’s request, WKU said that out of 20 total investigations, six resulted in a finding of a WKU policy violation.

“All six of those employees resigned from their respective positions prior to any final action by the university,” WKU said in its initial response, adding that the records are therefore preliminary and not subject to public review.

“We welcome the attorney general being involved in the case,” Abate said, describing WKU’s refusal to allow Beshear to inspect redacted copies of the records confidentially as “remarkable.”

Abate said Beshear’s interest in the case indicates larger issues at play, such as how transparent Kentucky’s universities and public agencies as a whole have to be.

“The university in this case has basically taken the position of ‘trust us,’ ” in its sexual misconduct investigations, Abate said.

More broadly, Abate said the accountability of Kentucky’s public agencies is also at stake. Most people don’t have the financial ability to sue public agencies, Abate said, stressing the importance of the attorney general’s right to review records and an agency’s reasons for withholding them.

Abate also responded to comments WKU President Gary Ransdell made publicly last week at a kickoff event for WKU’s Sexual Assault Prevention month.

“I will always, as long as the courts allow it, protect the identity of the victim. That right, the right to privacy, is a fundamental human right and only she or he has the right to choose to make the crime against her or him public,” Ransdell said at the event.

Ransdell continued by stressing the importance of protecting victims’ privacy.

“If you want to put a chill on sexual assault prevention then make it clear to women or men who choose not to go to the police but who want to file a complaint that their personal choice is subject to open records,” he said at the time. “Nothing would do more to deter women from coming forward more than the knowledge that their own pain will be proclaimed in the media.”

As a general rule, the media does not reveal the identities of sexual assault victims without their permission.

“I disagree strongly with his characterization of the case,” Abate said of Ransdell’s comments, adding he “gets it exactly backwards.”

Abate said the Herald’s request was never about revealing the identities of victims, “but how the university is conducting investigations to protect its students.”

Abate noted that Beshear’s order to release the records still allowed the university to redact the personal identifying information.

The next court date in the case has not been set, Abate said.

Unlike WKU, Kentucky State University has argued against allowing Beshear to intervene in a lawsuit it has with the Kernel. In a response to a motion to intervene from the attorney general, KSU argued that under state law the attorney general cannot be a party to open records litigation, the attorney general’s intervention isn’t needed to protect public interest and that the issue has already been decided by the U.S. Department of Education, among other reasons.

The next court date for the KSU case is Wednesday in Franklin Circuit Court.