Daily Times

The family of late country star Naomi Judd is fighting to keep case materials from her death private. On Aug. 2, Naomi’s husband Larry Strickland and daughter Wynonna Judd were granted a temporary order in Williamson County, Tenn. that prevents Williamson County Sherriff Dusty Rhoades from “disclosing certain records and other materials regarding the death of Naomi Judd pursuant to one or more Public Records Act requests,” per the legal documents.

They also requested an “emergency en parte restraining order” that would halt Rhoades from sharing any investigative materials because, per the documents, “not all persons needed for a just adjudication are currently before the court.” A date for the court to hear the family’s motion is set for Sept. 12, 2022. Until then, the order states that “any investigative or evidentiary materials” about the case, including “medical records, law enforcement investigative reports and photographs, video and other images” shall not be disclosed to the public.

E! News has reached out to Ashley and Wynonna’s reps, as well as the Williamson County Sherriff’s Department, but has received no comment.

On Aug. 1, the Judd family, including daughter Ashley Judd, filed for injunctive relief and requested that Naomi’s death records be kept private as they depict the singer in a “graphic manner,” per court documents obtained by NBC News. The family said that if photos or videos from the scene of Naomi’s death were released, it would cause them “emotional distress, pain and mental anguish,” adding, “the release of these records would continue to cause the entire family pain for years to come,” NBC News reported.

Naomi died by suicide in April at the age of 76. The singer, who was open about her struggle with mental health, was set to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame one day before her death.

“Today we sisters experienced a tragedy. We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness,” Ashley and Wynonna said in a social media statement. “We are shattered. We are navigating profound grief and know that as we loved her, she was loved by her public. We are in unknown territory.” This isn’t the first time the family has taken measures to keep information about Naomi’s death private. In a May interview with Diane Sawyer, Ashley shared her mother’s cause of death to prevent it from becoming public without the family’s consent. The actress noted that it was something the family was “very uncomfortable sharing, but understand that we’re in a position that if we don’t say it someone else is going to.”