In her latest legal filing asking a judge to restore to the Baltimore Office of the Inspector General the records access abruptly taken away by Mayor Brandon Scott’s Law Department, IG Isabel Mercedes Cumming cites an interesting source:

One of the Law Department’s own veteran attorneys, Chief Solicitor Hilary B. Ruley.

In a 2024 email to Comptroller Bill Henry’s office, Ruley stated that the IG’s request for information about an employee conforms with state law. Ruley also said the information must be provided, given the IG’s powers under the City Charter.

“The Comptroller can disclose the telephone information to the OIG under the [Maryland Public Information Act/ MPIA] because personnel records can always go to the employee herself or anyone supervising that employee,” Ruley wrote.

“The OIG is entitled to that access for all employees under the City Charter to further her investigations, which she does to inform the supervisors of that employee about the employee’s fitness for employment,” Ruley continued.

Part of Cumming’s lawsuit against Scott and the City Council, the filing goes further back in time. It not only cites the 2018 and 2022 voter-approved charter amendments that affirmed the IG’s independence, but also to Mayor Martin O’Malley when he created the watchdog office in 2005.

“Persons charged with preventing fraud, waste and abuse of office in government must be able to investigate vigorously and speak candidly without fear of retribution,” O’Malley’s executive order reads.

The city’s lawyers are litigating “as if those critical changes never existed,” the IG’s latest motion argues.

“The City cannot rewrite history and ignore that the City Charter reflects a concerted effort by the people of Baltimore to create an independent watchdog to ‘vigorously’ investigate instances of fraud, waste and abuse,” wrote Cumming’s attorneys, H. Mark Stitchel and Anthony J. May, in the motion filed late yesterday.

“The city’s position is the antithesis of accountability,” they continued, alleging that the Law Department is “rewriting the law to strip the OIG of its voter-mandated independence” and “actively working against the express will of the people as set forth in the City Charter.”

Power Struggle

The 42-page filing is the latest salvo fired in a dispute that broke out in January after the Scott administration cut off the IG’s access to the city’s email and server systems after accusing the office of gaining “unapproved and unfettered access” to a lawyer’s confidential work product.

Saying she was unable to perform her duties without access to city records, Cumming filed a lawsuit to enforce a subpoena for access to unredacted records.

Last month, claiming “full power” over Cumming’s office, the city asked Circuit Court Judge Pamela J. White to dismiss the suit, alleging that the office “can and will be used” to reach “parties with interests adverse to the city”

In a subsequent ruling, White denied the city’s request to seal documents in the case and questioned the Law Department’s assertions of broad authority.

The motion filed yesterday says the city mistakenly assumes that “that subpoenas issued by government investigative agencies to other agencies within the same municipality are MPIA requests.”

Rather, Cumming’s lawyers argue, “the OIG’s subpoena power is rooted in the Maryland Constitution and, by virtue of that constitutional authority, is an offshoot of the City’s police power to perform investigations that entitle it to information to perform its Charter-mandated functions.”

Confidentiality not Guaranteed

Testimony from Deputy Inspector General Matt Neil, highlighted how the watchdog office’s work has been hampered since the city shut off its information access.

Since 2017, when the OIG received 76 complaints, the workload has grown to more than 825 complaints annually, Neil said.

Without direct access to email correspondence, unredacted invoices,or other records, he wrote, his office is unable to promptly and accurately verify or corroborate the evidence, such as witness statements, obtained during an investigation.

Using the example of a redacted invoice, he said, the OIG could issue a subpoena to a third-party contractor for the invoice, but “without the City’s unredacted version for comparison, the OIG cannot verify the third-party contractor’s invoice is the same invoice the City employee reviewed and approved for payment.”

Without direct access to records, Neil said, “The OIG is limited in its ability to accurately, thoroughly, and confidentially investigate employee misconduct, safety issues, abuses of power, violations of law or administrative policy, contract or procurement fraud, financial waste or mismanagement, theft, embezzlement, conflicts of interest, whistleblower retaliation, bid-rigging, and a variety of other fraud, waste or abuse.”

Neil explained how the city’s current restrictions on access have also impacted his office’s ability to ensure confidentiality.

“Without direct access to email correspondence or other records, the OIG currently must name those involved in an investigation to the Baltimore City Law Department, whereas they would have only been known to the OIG previously and potentially BCIT,” he wrote. “Now those employees are liable to be retaliated against because the Law Department is aware of their involvement, which should remain confidential.”

Neil also said his office is being asked to provide the Law Department with the keywords it is using to perform investigatory email searches.

“Not only does this run the risk of the Law Department filtering out information that could be relevant” he wrote, ” But it requires the OIG to disclose key terms that compromise the confidentiality of the investigation because it discloses the very topics and areas of inquiry that should remain confidential.”

He added that “the  Law Department’s insertion and control over access to records also limits the OIG’s ability to investigate any allegations against the Law Department itself, which is expressly authorized under the City Charter.”

433 Mystery “logon events”

Other testimony included in the filing, from Assistant Inspector General of IT operations Bryan Bartsch, expressed concern about how many people in city government are now, without his office having any knowledge of it, accessing – and potentially altering – the common server shared by the OIG and the Ethics Board.

Reviewing a log provided by City Administrative Officer Faith Leach, Bartsch was able to determine that, just during the period from April 14-17, there were 433 “BCIT logon events.”

“This login could allow a user: to attach to and alter any running process (often abused by malware), to take control of any file or folder on the system bypassing permissions, to act as part of the operating system, to read or modify any file on the system under the guise of backing it up,” he wrote.

But Bartch noted he was, because of the access removed by the Scott administration in January, unable to determine who was peeking at the server or what they may have done.

“Due to the removal of my access to enterprise log review tools, I am unable to corroborate or confirm the accuracy of the report provided by Chief Administrative Officer Leach,” he wrote.

13 Outstanding Subpoenas

The Scott administration’s new access policies have slowed down the pace of IG investigations, Neil said.

The watchdog office currently has 13 outstanding subpoenas to Baltimore City Information Technology (BCIT), the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement (MONSE) and the Law Department for correspondence. Nine of these subpoenas have been pending since March 2026.

“Had the OIG retained the access it had prior to January 24, 2026, it would have been able to pull the relevant data within days,” Neil wrote. “Instead, months have gone by resulting in a backlog and delay in the ability to complete investigations and move on to others.”

The city has until July 9 to respond. An in-person hearing before Judge White has been scheduled for July 28.