Police Reports and the CPRA
Q: This message pertains to obtaining police reports taken. I have been told by LAPD that unless I am the one who files a police report I cannot get copies. How can this not be public information? If the report was filed against me am I entitled to a copy? I have had approx 50-75 police reports filed against me by my insane neighbor and I am preparing to file legal action. I need the police reports for evidence. How do I get them? The police will not give them to me.
A: The California Supreme Court has held that the general public does not have a right of access to the actual physical copies of police reports. In a case called Williams v. Superior Court, 5 Cal. 4th 337 (1993), the California Supreme Court said that, in enacting the California Public Records Act (CPRA), “the state Legislature … limited the CPRA’s exemption for law enforcement investigatory files,” in Government Code § 6254(f), “by requiring agencies to disclose specific information derived from the materials in investigatory files rather than the materials, themselves.” Thus, the Court said, the “required disclosures of information derived from the records about incidents, arrests, and complaints [or requests for assistance to law enforcement] need not, in most cases, entail disclosure of the records themselves.”
Here’s what the CPRA, in section 6254(f), says the department has to provide to the public: “the time, substance, and location of all complaints or requests for assistance received by the agency and the time and nature of the response thereto, including, to the extent the information regarding crimes alleged or committed or any other incident investigated is recorded, the time, date, and location of occurrence, [and] the time and date of the report, the name, age, and current address of the victim ….” Agencies must also disclose to the public “[t]he full name, current address, and occupation of every individual arrested by the agency, the individual’s physical description including date of birth, color of eyes and hair, sex, height and weight, the time and date of arrest, the time and date of booking, the location of the arrest, the factual circumstances surrounding the arrest, the amount of bail set, the time and manner of release or the location where the individual is currently being held, and all charges the individual is being held upon, including any outstanding warrants from other jurisdictions and parole or probation holds.”
As a practical matter, however, many law enforcement agencies have decided it is easier to provide copies of police reports or particular pages of police blotters regarding a particular incident rather than orally provide the information that the CPRA requires them to disclose. However, under the Williams case, they have an argument that they do not have to disclose the actual police reports themselves if they don’t want to.
Although victims have additional rights of access under section 6254(f), the PRA does not provide such rights to a person against whom the report is filed. However, once you file a legal action, you may be able to obtain the reports themselves as part of the discovery process, which operates under a different set of rules than the Public Records Act.