[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State 

ex rel. Straughter v. Ohio Dept. of Rehab. & Corr., Slip Opinion No. 2023-Ohio-1543.]

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. 2023-OHIO-1543

THE STATE EX REL. STRAUGHTER v. OHIO DEPARTMENT OF REHABILITATION 

AND CORRECTION.

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 

may be cited as State ex rel. Straughter v. Ohio Dept. of Rehab. & Corr., Slip 

Opinion No. 2023-Ohio-1543.]

Mandamus—Public-records requests—Inmate does not dispute public office’s 

representation that it has provided to him all kites he requested—Public 

office has not demonstrated that inmate made his requests solely with 

expectation that they would be denied and he could then collect statutory 

damages—Writ denied as moot, $1,000 in statutory damages awarded, and 

request for court costs denied.

(No. 2022-0983—Submitted February 28, 2023—Decided May 10, 2023.)

IN MANDAMUS.

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Per Curiam.
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO

2

{¶ 1} Relator, Valdez J. Straughter, seeks a writ of mandamus to compel 

respondent, the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (“DRC”), to 

provide documents in response to public-records requests he submitted, to pay him 

statutory damages, and to pay court costs. We previously denied DRC’s motion to 

dismiss Straughter’s complaint and granted an alternative writ. 168 Ohio St.3d 

1412, 2022-Ohio-3636, 196 N.E.3d 837. We now deny as moot the writ of 

mandamus and award Straughter $1,000 in statutory damages. We decline to award 

court costs.

Background

{¶ 2} In State ex rel. Mobley v. Ohio Dept. of Rehab. & Corr., 169 Ohio 

St.3d 39, 2022-Ohio-1765, 201 N.E.3d 853, ¶ 26, we held that prison kites are 

public records subject to disclosure under R.C. 149.43. Less than two weeks after

our decision in Mobley was released, Straughter, who is an inmate at the London 

Correctional Institution, sent a request by prison kite for three records. DRC 

indicated that it would provide the first requested record but that the other two 

records “are Electronic Kites and the IIS Office does not provide copies of kites, 

only ICR/Grievances.” DRC referred Straughter to a DRC employee “regarding 

the process to obtain copies of kites.”

{¶ 3} Within a few hours after DRC sent its response, Straughter sent a 

second request, formally “making a public records request pursuant to Ohio 

Revised Code 149.43(B)” for the two kites DRC had declined to provide. DRC 

again denied the request, stating that “[k]ites are not available as public records.” 

The same day, Straughter submitted another public-records request for three

additional kites. DRC denied the request.

{¶ 4} The next day, Straughter sent a request to the DRC employee he had 

been referred to, requesting four kites he had previously requested and one new 

one. DRC again denied the request.
January Term, 2023

3

{¶ 5} Two days later, Straughter requested another kite. In response to that 

request, after denying it, DRC asked Straughter to “[p]lease refrain from asking the 

same questions regarding the same subject as the response remains the same in 

accordance with policy.” DRC gave Straughter a “formal directive, in writing, to 

stop the repetitive requests surrounding this request.”

{¶ 6} Straughter then filed a complaint for a writ of mandamus in this court. 

After we issued an alternative writ, Straughter submitted evidence and the parties 

filed merit briefs.

Analysis

The mandamus claim is moot

{¶ 7} Mandamus is an appropriate remedy by which to compel compliance 

with Ohio’s Public Records Act, R.C. 149.43. R.C. 149.43(C)(1)(b). To prevail in 

a public-records mandamus action, the relator must prove, by clear and convincing 

evidence, that the requested records exist and that they are public records 

maintained by the office that received the request. See State ex rel. Cordell v. 

Paden, 156 Ohio St.3d 394, 2019-Ohio-1216, 128 N.E.3d 179, ¶ 8.

{¶ 8} As his first proposition of law, Straughter argues that the kites he 

requested are public records that should have been provided to him. DRC responds 

that the requests are moot because on November 8, 2022, DRC provided Straughter 

with copies of the kites that he had requested. Straughter did not file a reply brief 

disputing DRC’s contention that it has provided all the requested kites. We

therefore deny the writ of mandamus as moot. See State ex rel. Striker v. Smith, 

129 Ohio St.3d 168, 2011-Ohio-2878, 950 N.E.2d 952, ¶ 22 (a public-records 

mandamus claim generally becomes moot when the public office provides the 

requested documents).

Statutory damages

{¶ 9} Under R.C. 149.43(C)(2), a requester of public records is entitled to 

recover statutory damages when (1) he has submitted a written public-records 
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request “by hand delivery, electronic submission, or certified mail,” (2) the request 

“fairly describes the public record or class of public records to the public office or 

person responsible for the requested public records,” and (3) “a court determines 

that the public office or the person responsible for public records failed to comply 

with an obligation” imposed by R.C. 149.43(B). Statutory damages accrue at $100 

for each business day during which the public office failed to comply with R.C. 

149.43(B), beginning with the day on which the requester filed a mandamus action 

to recover statutory damages, up to a maximum of $1,000. R.C. 149.43(C)(2).

{¶ 10} DRC does not dispute that it breached its obligations under the 

Public Records Act. Straughter filed this mandamus action on August 11, 2022, so 

the potential statutory damages reached the $1,000 maximum long before the 

records were produced on November 8.

{¶ 11} But DRC argues that statutory damages should not be awarded,

because “[i]t is clear from the circumstances surrounding this case that [Straughter] 

did not actually want the records requested, but instead wanted the request to be 

denied in order to obtain statutory damages.” In support of this argument, DRC 

cites Rhodes v. New Philadelphia, 129 Ohio St.3d 304, 2011-Ohio-3279, 951 

N.E.2d 782, ¶ 27, for the proposition that “[w]hen a party requests access to public 

records with the specific desire for access to be denied, it cannot be said that the 

party is using the request in order to access public records; he is only feigning that 

intent.”

{¶ 12} In Rhodes, the requester sent public-records requests in 2007 to eight 

political subdivisions for reel-to-reel police tape recordings made between 1975 

and 1995. Id. at ¶ 2-3. When some of those recordings were located, he did not 

ask to listen to them, to receive transcripts of them, or to have them copied for his 

use. Id. at ¶ 3. Nor did he pursue claims against the departments that had destroyed 

the recordings pursuant to valid records-retention schedules. Instead, he sought 

statutory damages from only the one department that had improperly destroyed the 
January Term, 2023

5

recordings, claiming to have been “aggrieved” by the destruction.1 Id. at ¶ 4. We

rejected the claim, holding that the requester was not “aggrieved” by the destruction 

of recordings he never wanted in the first place. Id. at ¶ 27.

{¶ 13} By contrast, DRC has not demonstrated that Straughter made his 

requests solely with the expectation that they would be denied and he could then 

collect statutory damages. DRC suggests that Straughter made his requests when 

he did—shortly after Mobley was decided—to “take advantage of the situation, 

assuming that in all likelihood, DRC central office would not be able to 

communicate or educate the warden’s [sic] administrative assistants as to this 

significant change in the law in such a short period of time.” This is pure 

speculation. Here, unlike in Rhodes, no evidence that Straughter’s requests were 

shams has been introduced.

{¶ 14} Alternatively, DRC claims that Straughter had access to the

requested kites at all times through his JPay account. But DRC has not established 

that alleged fact by filing an affidavit or other evidence. DRC’s bare allegation that 

Straughter could have accessed the kites another way does not prove that he 

requested them from DRC in the expectation that his request would be denied.

{¶ 15} Finally, DRC argues that Straughter’s choice to continue prosecuting 

this case even though the mandamus portion is moot “further proves the point that 

he is just attempting to get a statutory damages award.” But the fact that a publicrecords requester continues to pursue statutory damages despite the mootness of the 

underlying mandamus claim reveals nothing about the requester’s underlying 

motive for originally making the request. We have long held that even though a

mandamus action is moot, statutory damages may be awarded based on the 

unreasonable amount of time the public office had taken to provide the requested 

records. See, e.g., State ex rel. Kesterson v. Kent State Univ., 156 Ohio St.3d 13, 

1. R.C. 149.351(B) authorizes any person who is “aggrieved” by the removal or destruction of public 

records to file suit and recover $1,000 for each violation, up to a maximum of $10,000.
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO

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2018-Ohio-5108, 123 N.E.3d 887, ¶ 20-22. DRC’s argument would require us to 

overrule Kesterson and to deny statutory damages whenever the public office has 

made an untimely production of records.

Court costs

{¶ 16} Straughter requests an award of court costs. Because Straughter filed 

an affidavit of indigency in this matter, there are no court costs to award.

Conclusion

{¶ 17} We deny the writ of mandamus as moot and award Straughter $1,000 

in statutory damages. The request for court costs is denied.

Writ denied.

KENNEDY, C.J., and DEWINE, DONNELLY, STEWART, BRUNNER, and 

DETERS, JJ.

FISCHER, J., concurs in part and dissents in part and would not award 

statutory damages.

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Valdez J. Straughter, pro se.

Dave Yost, Attorney General, and John H. Bates, Assistant Attorney

General, for respondent.

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