Judge orders the release of Romney testimony

Canton - Judge Jennifer Ulwick has ruled in favor of the The Boston Globe's request to release documents containing Mitt Romney's testimony during a friend’s divorce trial.

Maureen Stemberg Sullivan and Thomas G. Stemberg, co-founder of Staples, were embroiled in a bitter divorce in the late 1980's. All court records of the case were sealed and both parties signed a confidentiality agreement that Sullivan's attorney, Gloria Allred, called “the most comprehensive gag order I have ever seen in my 36 years of practicing law.” In 1990, Sullivan filed a lawsuit following Staples' 1989 IPO. The initial public offering raised $37 million for the company according to a Stable's Inc. history report. According to Sullivan, the IPO also caused stock values to jump an estimated 10 times higher than what she had received in the divorce a year earlier. Romney had testified during the lawsuit in June 1991 and Sullivan has claimed that Romney intentionally misled the court regarding the value of Staples. According to a WBZ-TV report, the Boston Globe filed a motion on October 16th asking that Romney's testimony and other court records be released, telling the court that the public has a right to know what he said during his testimony. The attorneys for Romney, Stemberg and Staples did not object to the release of the documents, however they did request that the judge allow them 24 hours to review the documents, which the judge allowed. The Boston Herald is reporting that Judge Ulwick has ordered that the documents be unsealed and released.