House Speaker Mike Schultz doubled down Saturday on the need for an investigation into alleged misconduct by Utah Supreme Court Justice Diana Hagen, even as the high court and a judicial oversight board said the release of a preliminary review of the allegations broke the law.

At the Davis County GOP’s convention Saturday, Schultz, R-Hooper, told delegates that “the fact that they refused to do a full investigation should have us all upset” and shows that “there’s no checks and balances inside the judiciary.”

On Friday, the Utah Supreme Court said in a statement that the findings of the Judicial Conduct Commission’s preliminary investigation into a complaint against Hagen is, by law, confidential and was “inappropriately released to the public”

The Judicial Conduct Commission reiterated that position Friday evening in a denial of an open records request by The Salt Lake Tribune.

“The JCC disapproves of any unlawful release of records,” Alex Peterson, the executive director of the commission, said in a letter explaining the denial.

Nonetheless, the file was provided to numerous news outlets Friday morning by the Utah House of Representatives in response to Government Records Access and Management Act requests after having been first sent to KSL in response to the outlet’s request.

“As to any records released by the Utah Legislature, the JCC legal position is that those records are and remain protected and confidential” under laws governing the commission and the Government Records Access and Management Act, or GRAMA, Peterson wrote. “The JCC was not consulted prior to their release.”

In an email to KSL, Peterson wrote: “Any response to a GRAMA that disclosed details [of the investigation] would have been illegal.”

It is a class B misdemeanor for anyone to release records that are classified as private under the law.

What remains unclear is how the House obtained the records in the first place. Utah law says all proceedings and records of Judicial Conduct Commission investigations are confidential until the Supreme Court, which is responsible for disciplining judges, acts on any recommendations from the commission.

“We followed the statute in releasing the records,” Schultz told Utah News Dispatch in reference to the Supreme Court’s statement Friday.

On Sunday, Rep. Grant Miller, D-Salt Lake City, who is the Democratic House member on the Judicial Conduct Commission, said he did not share the report with anyone.

And Rep. Jordan Teuscher, R-South Jordan, the Republican House member on the commission and the only other House member who legally would have had access to the investigative report, said Saturday that he didn’t give it to anyone, either.

Teuscher said House members, including leadership, don’t have access to JCC files. “The only way they would have been able to get the report is if someone on the JCC had it in their legislative email” or their files, he said.

“I guess whoever is the GRAMA steward for the Legislature, as they went through it, they read the statute and said, ‘We have to release this,’” Teuscher said, “but I can tell you, it wasn’t in mine.”

Teuscher sponsored a new addition to GRAMA this session, along with Sen. Brady Brammer, R-Pleasant Grove, the Senate Republican on the JCC, explicitly reiterating that investigative reports are confidential, but it doesn’t take effect until May 6.

The JCC consists of 11 members: two senators and two House members, one from each party; three appointees by the governor; and two judges and two lawyers appointed by the Supreme Court.

The preliminary investigation looked at a complaint submitted by attorney Michael Worley and included a claim by Justice Hagen’s ex-husband, Tobin Hagen, that she had an affair with one of the lawyers on the state’s high-profile congressional redistricting case, Dave Reymann.

Reymann also represents the Utah Media Coalition, which includes The Tribune and KSL.

Justice Hagen said in a sworn statement that she renewed a friendship with Reymann five months after Hagen wrote a unanimous opinion in the redistricting case. Since then, she recused herself in three cases involving Reymann that have come before the court.

Staff concluded that “the allegations as presented in the complaint are speculative, overstated, and misleading. There is very little credibility to this complaint.” The commission voted to accept the recommendation to dismiss the case.

Worley, who filed the complaint, said he approves of the outcome.

But on Thursday, House Speaker Schultz, Senate President J. Stuart Adams, and Gov. Spencer Cox told KSL they were launching a full investigation into the allegations.

Teuscher said Saturday he cannot discuss how he voted in the JCC, but he supports the actions of Schultz, Adams and Cox.

Schultz told Davis County delegates the courts have taken away the Legislature’s authority to draw political boundaries and that lawmakers “are likely to come to you this fall, in November, with a constitutional amendment to help us get our judiciary back in line, placing the balance of powers back where it should be. We’re going to need your help.”

Legislative leaders have floated the idea of a constitutional amendment on the issue for months but have not provided any specifics.

The investigation comes as the Legislature suffers from a string of defeats in the courts and follows efforts by the Republican-led body to rein in what it calls judicial activism. Earlier this year, GOP lawmakers and Cox added two justices to the Supreme Court, created a special court to hear challenges to government actions and enacted other reforms targeting the courts.

Note to readers: April 20, 12:05 p.m. • This story has been updated to include a comment from Rep. Grant Miller and to correct who appoints members of the Judicial Conduct Commission.