By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Princeton University and website Planet Princeton are trying to reach a settlement over a lawsuit the site brought seeking the release of documents detailing response protocols between the university security force and the municipal police, a source familiar with the matter said Tuesday.
Planet Princeton founder Krystal Knapp is seeking documents, including a map, explaining what agency responds to what kind of situation. The town is no longer blocking the release of the information, but the university has stepped forward to prevent the disclosure on the grounds of maintaining security.
Ms. Knapp’s case was scheduled to be heard Thursday for oral arguments before Mercer County Superior Court Judge Mary C. Jacobson, but the hearing has been put off until June 22. Her attorney, Walter M. Luers, declined to comment Tuesday.
University spokesman Dan Day also declined to comment Tuesday.
Ms. Knapp originally sued the town and municipal clerk Linda McDermott in March, in state Superior Court, to compel the release of the documents. Her original request of the town, made in February, was denied for security reasons, only for the town to reverse itself.
That’s when the university stepped in.
In May 2013, the university Department of Public Safety and the Police Department reached an agreement on operating procedures. In it, the two agencies said they have “concurrent police jurisdiction over those geographic areas of the Princeton University campus and its vicinity within the political subdivision of the town of Princeton.”
The Princeton Packet has obtained a redacted version of that original agreement, without the accompanying map showing jurisdictional boundaries.
The university has hired an outside attorney, James P. Lidon, to handle the case. Among his specialties, Mr. Lidon represents public entities caught up in legal actions involving the state Open Public Records Act and the state Open Public Meetings Act, according to his profile on his law firm’s website.
