DeWine not talking about email

They served together in the Senate for a few short years, but Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine and presumed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton have more than that in common.DeWine was defeated in 2006 by Democrat U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, and Clinton left the Senate to become U.S. Secretary of State in 2009.Undeterred after 12 years in the Senate, DeWine was elected Ohio Attorney General in 2010.Hillary, and DeWine both maintained personal email accounts to conduct business since their career changes. And, like Hillary, DeWine's not talking about it.DeWine was asked about his personal email account — mike@silverdollarbaseball.com — but did not respond.His spokesman was copied on the email to DeWine, but he, too, did not not respond to the inquiry, which asked:1. Are emails in this personal account equal in status to emails generated by you, or by any public official conducting public business in a similar fashion, to emails generated in public email accounts? Please explain.2. Are emails in this personal account recorded or captured in any required or legislated retention schedule for public record, again, in equal status to public emails? Are these collected in the same, or similar fashion? Please explain.3. How is your use of this personal email account different from former secretary of state Hillary Clinton's use of personal, instead of, public email accounts to conduct public business? How is it the same? Please explain.4. In your view, is there a problem or concern from a records or legal standpoint, with Clinton or other public officials utilizing a private email system in lieu of public email as it's been reported in the New York Times? Please explain.DeWine's chief in the Constitutional law unit of the attorney general's office, Damian W. Sikora, provided a written response for DeWine that does not include answers to the specific questions the attorney general was asked."The attorney general's office strives to fully comply with both the spirit and letter of Ohio's Sunshine Laws, including the (state's) Public Records Act," Sikora wrote in reply to the email that was sent to DeWine on his personal account.It's not clear why Sikora did not give specific answers, but the attorney general's office has in the past failed to release public records in a timely fashion and has improperly cited exemptions in state law to upend disclosure of crime reports.The most recent example of that centers on the report of the Put-in-Bay police corruption investigation from Ottawa County Sheriff Steve Levorchick. Levorchick gave DeWine the report Jan. 1.DeWine has refused to allow it to be released to the public and on Feb. 27 substituted a press release and a memorandum to a judge instead of releasing the sheriff's full report, which contains numerous allegations of wrongdoing against the police. The Danbury police also have been prevented by DeWine's office from making crime reports available. The most recent involves the suspects in a theft case that's been called the largest heist in county history. Detective Mark Meisler said he was instructed by a prosecutor in DeWine's office to re-route all inquiries to the attorney general. "(We were told) any further media requests for related reports should be requested through his office," Meisler told the Register Friday morning in response to a public records request from the newspaper. "If I receive word from the attorney general's office that these reports can be released from the Danbury Township Police Department I will surely comply with your requests." AP photoRegister photo