Case Title: State ex rel. Souffrance v. Doe

Citation: 2012-Ohio-1906

Docket Number: 2011-0823

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2012-05-03T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as 
State ex rel. Souffrance v. Doe, Slip Opinion No. 2012-Ohio-1906.] 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in 
an advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested 
to promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 
65 South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or 
other formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be 
made before the opinion is published. 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2012-OHIO-1906 
STATE EX REL. SOUFFRANCE, APPELLANT, v. DOE,  
RECORDS CUSTODIAN, APPELLEE. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets,  
it may be cited as State ex rel. Souffrance v. Doe,  
Slip Opinion No. 2012-Ohio-1906.] 
Court of appeals’ judgment dismissing petition for writ of mandamus affirmed. 
(No. 2011-0823—Submitted April 24, 2012—Decided May 3, 2012.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Hamilton County, No. C-110090. 
__________________ 
 
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} We affirm the judgment of the court of appeals dismissing the 
petition of appellant, inmate Sidney Souffrance, for a writ of mandamus to 
compel appellee, the records custodian for the Life Skills Center of Cincinnati, 
Inc., a community school, to provide access to the attendance records, addresses, 
and telephone numbers of all the students who were in a certain classroom in the 
months of May and June 2002 and to records indicating which computer terminal 
a specific student had used from May 1, 2002, through May 30, 2002. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
2 
 
{¶ 2} Souffrance claims that because the records he is requesting relate 
only to persons who are no longer students, the court of appeals erred in holding 
that the disclosure of the requested records concerning the Life Skills Center 
students is barred by the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (“FERPA”), 
20 U.S.C. 1232g.1  But this claim lacks merit because the persons were students 
when the records were created and originally maintained.  See 20 U.S.C. 
1232g(a)(6) (“For the purposes of this section, the term ‘student’ includes any 
person with respect to whom an educational agency or institution maintains 
education records or personally identifiable information, but does not include a 
person who has not been in attendance at such agency or institution”); see also 73 
Fed.Reg. 74806, 74811 (2008) (“It has long been the Department [of Education]’s 
interpretation that records created or received by an educational agency or 
institution on a former student that are directly related to the individual’s 
attendance as a student are not excluded from the definition of education records 
under FERPA,” and so such records are subject to the nondisclosure provisions of 
the act [emphasis added]); Unincorporated Operating Div. of Indiana 
Newspapers, Inc. v. Trustees of Indiana Univ., 787 N.E.2d 893, 909 
(Ind.App.2003) (ordering trial court on remand—in public-records case brought 
by newspaper against university trustees—to redact any portion of records that 
might contain “information that could identify any present or former students in 
violation of the confidentiality mandated by FERPA” [emphasis added]); R.C. 
3319.321(B). 
Judgment affirmed. 
                                          
 
1. Souffrance does not raise the contention that FERPA merely sets conditions on the receipt of 
federal funds and does not constitute a prohibition on the release of public records under R.C. 
149.43(A)(1)(v), which exempts “[r]ecords the release of which is prohibited by state or federal 
law,” so we need not address that issue in this appeal.  Compare State ex rel. ESPN v. Ohio State 
Univ., case No. 2011-1177, where that issue is raised. 
January Term, 2012 
3 
 
O’CONNOR, C.J., and PFEIFER, LUNDBERG STRATTON, O’DONNELL, 
LANZINGER, CUPP, and MCGEE BROWN, JJ., concur. 
__________________ 
 
Sidney Lee Souffrance, pro se. 
 
Janik, L.L.P., Steven G. Janik, Audrey K. Bentz, and Sean T. Needham, 
for appellee. 
______________________