"A bill to restrict access to records listing Virginians with permits to carry concealed handguns died Monday in a Senate committee.

The bill sponsored by Del. Dave Nutter, R-Christiansburg, stemmed from an incident last March when a Roanoke Times editorial writer wrote a column that encouraged people to check the list of concealed-carry permit holders and included a link to a state police database of all the permit holders.

The newspaper received hundreds of complaints and removed the online database within 24 hours.

The Senate Courts of Justice Committee voted 8-7 Monday to carry over Nutter’s legislation, House Bill 982, for study until next year.

“I am somewhat surprised,” Nutter said of the committee’s vote. The thrust of his bill would have prohibited public disclosure of the names and information on the state police database.

The House of Delegates had passed his bill on a 97-1 vote three weeks ago after amending it to allow circuit court clerks to release the names of permit holders in their city or county while keeping other identifying information secret.

That amendment was the point on which the bill got hung up in the Senate Courts of Justice Committee.

Nutter said he would not mind if the committee deleted the provision.

Sen. Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, R-Fairfax County, said he could not support the bill unless it contained the language to protect the information of permit holders from disclosure.

“I am not willing to expose these people to the danger that everybody else, including your local paper there,” would expose them to, Cuccinelli told Nutter, referring to the Roanoke Times.

“For some reason, certain newspapers want to be voyeurs and want to hold these people up to a certain level of scrutiny that no other citizens of the commonwealth face” by printing names and information about the permit holders, Nutter agreed. These are “people who are not doing anything wrong,” Nutter added.

Sen. R. Creigh Deeds, D-Bath County, said he did not want to kill the bill “but I want to make sure that we get it right.”

Deeds and other Democrats declined to remove the language that would have allowed circuit court clerks to keep portions of the permit records secret and voted to carry over the bill for study.

Nutter said there was a fear that allowing some secret records in circuit courts “would open up a flood of legislation coming down to block access” to other public records in courts, such as divorce decrees.

“Let’s take care of the core issue, the statewide database,” Nutter urged to no avail, saying the issue of access to public record information in courts could be dealt with later. The committee put off the entire bill on a straight party-line vote." (Bob Gibson, The Daily Progress, February 26, 2008)