Attorney General Andy Beshear’s office ruled in favor of The Kentucky Kernel’s appeal for sexual assault records at Kentucky State University and Western Kentucky University.

The universities refused the Kernel’s request for employee sexual misconduct investigative reports of the last five years.

The behavior mirrors that of the University of Kentucky, which sued its student newspaper to appeal a similar Attorney General decision in August of 2016.

KSU General Counel Gordon Rowe said that the university will appeal the Attorney General’s decision, which means it will have to sue the Kernel. 

“The University believes that the decision rendered by Fayette Circuit Court Judge Thomas Clark in the recent case of University of Kentucky v. The Kernel Press, Inc., is directly on point and must govern any analysis of the dispute in this case,” Rowe said in an email to the Kernel.

WKU had no comment Monday morning, but Kentuky law dictates that the public institutions have 30 days after the decision is released to appeal in court before it has the weight of law.

Editor’s note: This story will be updated as more information becomes available.