Political Reform Act case records

Answer

Under the California Public Records Act, certain law enforcement information can be properly withheld. Specifically, under California Government Code section 6254(f), records of complaints and investigations of law enforcement agencies may be withheld from the public. However, certain information is subject to disclosure under the California Public Records Act unless disclosure would endanger the safety of a witness or other person involved in the investigation, or unless disclosure would endanger the successful completion of the investigation. See Gov’t Code § 6254(f). In other words, the information described in Section 6254(f)(2) must be disclosed to the public unless disclosure would endanger a person or the completion of the investigation.

Therefore, under Section 6254(f), the District Attorney theoretically can withhold information pertaining to open cases on the grounds that the investigations would be endangered. However, that being said, the response you received from the District Attorney seems extremely overbroad. Simply making a blanket claim that any information on open cases would endanger the investigation does not constitute any showing that disclosure would actually endanger the safety of a person involved in the investigation, or endanger the successful completion of the investigation. You might want to press the District Attorney for an explanation (on a case-by-case basis) of how exactly the investigation would be harmed, and how the purported harm applies to all open cases.

Instead of working from the assumption that the information identified in Section 6254(f)(2) is presumptively open to the public, the District Attorney appears to be working from the incorrect assumption that all such information is not open. You might also want to direct her attention to the provisions of Section 6254(f) that provides: “state and local law enforcement agencies shall make public the following information (i.e., the information identified in Section 6254(f)(2)), except to the extent that disclosure of a particular item of information would endanger the safety of a person involved in an investigation or would endanger the successful completion of the investigation or a related investigation.”