Question
In August 2010 myself and three others were passing out Christian prolife materials to clients approaching a Planned Parenthood (PP) clinic. The PP is located in a public commercial strip mall and shares a common parking lot with the other businesses.
A private security official threatened us with arrest if we did not move off the parking areas. We were not blocking, or occupying any spaces. We declined and five Sheriff’s deputies eventually arrived. One of the deputies demanded my ID as I stood on the public sidewalk. At this time we were all on the sidewalk. I declined after the deputy would not advise me of why she wanted it. She advised that “when the Lt. arrives she will advise you.”
I and the others then relinquished our ID. Four of us had our ID taken by the deputy. The deputies, and eventually the Lt. all conferred together with the private security official, and then left the scene without telling any of us of any alleged infraction or complaint.
The private security official then approached each of us handing us a written notification bearing our personal identifying information, threatening to arrest us for trespass if we came onto any area of the parking lot of any of the businesses in the strip mall.
We asked him how he had obtained our ID’s but he would not answer. He could of only obtained it from one of the deputies.
One week after the incident I made a formal complaint verbally and in writing to the Sheriff’s Office asking for explanation of their giving our ID’s to to the private security company. They refused to give us an explanation and the Lt. who was to do so refused because we wanted to openly record her statements to us.
In June 2011 I received a boilerplate letter of response from the department saying that their ”administrative investigation” regarding my complaint was ”non sustained.” It gave me NO responses to my detailed request in the formal request.
On July 29th I filed a CA Records Act request ”to inspect and obtain” the investigation into my formal complaint as well as dispatch log information which resulted in the deputies responding to our location as well as any report by the deputies in response to that dispatch.
In their letter dated Aug. 3, 2011, I was advised that my request ”is denied.” The letter then cites exemptions under Gov. Code section 6254 (k), CPC 832.7 and Gov. Code 6254 (f).
I believe that our First Amendment rights have been trampled on and the denial of the records request is an effort to cover the actions of the deputies.
Lastly, please be advised that our actions on the day of the incident were polite and reasonable in all respects.
Answer
The availability of police records is governed by Govt. Code section 6254(f). That section defines both the records that law enforcement agencies may withhold from the public and what information it must extract from its records and provide to the public.
Among the records exempt from disclosure are “records of complaints to , or investigations conducted by. . . or any investigatory or security files compiled by any other state or local police agency. . . .”
There is no temporal limitation on this exemption: it applies equally to ongoing and closed investigations. Williams v. Superior Court, 5 Cal. 4th 337 (1993).
The information required to be extracted from such records upon request basically falls into four categories:
(1) incident and witness information that need be disclosed only to the victim and his or her insurance agency;
(2) arrest information;
(3) calls-for-assistance and dispatch information; and
(4) contact information for arrestees and victims as long as such information will not be used for commercial purposes.
(Please read the section to see the specifics of the information that must be disclosed.)
There are exceptions for information the disclosure of which would interfere with an ongoing investigation or endanger a witness.
However, Penal Code section 832.7, does in fact bar a police department from releasing its internal investigative records that personally identify the officer being investigated.
Thus, even though the exemptions set forth in section 6254(f) are otherwise permissive, a police department has no discretion to disclose these records.The only exception is that as the complainant, you are entitled to a copy of any statement you gave to them. Penal Code section 832.7(b)
Asked & Answered posts should not be relied on as legal advice, and FAC makes no guarantees about their completeness or accuracy. All posts carry a date of publication that readers should take note of in assessing their usefulness, given that laws and interpretations of them may change over time. Posts predating Jan. 1, 2023, that discuss the California Public Records Act may contain statute numbers no longer in use. Please see this page for a table showing how the California Public Records Act has been renumbered.