Those who research historical records - as I do for Quiet Title actions, family history and heir locates - will find the new California Voter Registrations - 1900-1968, supplied by Ancestry.com very helpful. You can search a name for free, but a subscription is required to view an image of the record.

The State of Connecticut Judicial Branch, Conviction & Bond Forfeiture Dispositions Criminal/Motor Vehicle database supplements the Pending Criminal Cases search.

The holdings and limitations are described at the site.

# Each Criminal And Motor Vehicle Charge Disposed On And After January 1, 2000 In Which The Court Disposition Was A Conviction Is Included

# Each Criminal And Motor Vehicle Charge In Which The Court Action Was Concluded By A Bond Forfeiture Order On And After January 1, 2000 Is Included

* A Motor Vehicle Matter Disposed By Way Of Bond Forfeiture Is Deemed A Conviction Pursuant To Connecticut General Statutes Section 14-1(a)(18)

# Youthful Offender And Juvenile Cases Are Not Displayed

# This Criminal History Record Information May Change Daily Due To Erasures, Corrections, Pardons, And Other Modifications To Individual Criminal History Record Information.

Identify civil surgeons who have been designated by the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services to perform medical exams on applicants. Search by state or zip code. Or search by name from a search engine with the query: name site:uscis.gov. Replace the word name with the personal name.

Find criminal and administrative actions against doctors at the Drug Enforcement Administration, Diversion Control Program site. A search by last name or year returns name, location, date of arrest, conviction result, DEA registration status and a case summary. This database goes back to 2003. Search older registrant actions from a search engine with the query: name site:www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/.

I was setting out to write about state lookup and registration of “Do Not Call” and “No Call” phone numbers. More on this in a moment. I’m diverging to mention a few voter registration lookup links. The Federal Voting Assistance Program, U.S. Department of Defense collects links to State Voter Registration Verification Web sites. The participating states provide this service for residents to confirm their voter registration status. The sites may variously require a name, date of birth, street number or address to verify whether the individual is registered to vote.

A few non governmental sites that collect links to public records have a category dedicated to voter records. Black Book Online has 63 links to city, county or state government voter registration lookup. Search Systems has some additional links, but there are variations in both collections. And neither has Southington, Connecticut Voter Registration Lookup included. Imagine that! Read my prior posts on voter registration verification.

Okay, on to Do-Not-Call phone lookup sites. The Tennessee Do-Not-Call Citizen Registration Lookup returns a street number match to the provided telephone number. The Missouri Registration Lookup for No Call List verifies whether a phone number is on the list and the date it was registered.

Do you know of other voter confirmation or Do-Not-Call registration sites?

Some states, counties and towns list current registered voters on a Web site. But you might also look for databases and PDF files that voter registrars and town clerks compile of formerly registered voters. States and local agencies variously refer to these non current registered voters lists as purged, inactive or excluded. Use advanced search operators at a search engine to search by different phrases, file types and site domains to identify inactive voters lists. Here are a few I found.

Darien, Connecticut roll of inactive voters.

Voter Purge List, Madison County, Alabama residents.

City of St. Louis Inactive Voters List.

Knox County, Tennessee Purged Inactive Voters is available as of 2005.

Inactive Voter Status - Barnstable, Massachusetts

And, just to remind us that easy come, easy go…In 2000, People for the American Way published a Central Voter File Exclusions List of registered voters Florida planned to purge from the rolls as purported felons. The list was never used and People for the American Way has since removed it from their server.

The online telephone directory, 411.com isn’t just for finding listed telephone numbers. Use it to identify current employment or to expand the employment history profile of your subject. A search on my name in California returned 40 results. Some are home listings, but other records are work contacts. These are extracted from the Internet - Web pages and Zoominfo - and may supplement the business associations found at various other people finder sites.

Google the work designation “Mt Diablo Soccer League” to find a photo, phone number and email for this Tamara Thompson.

Most of the free lookup, fee-based people finder sites - PeopleFinders, Voompeople, Privateeye, to name a few, - contain the same data, although those may list corporation and DBA records not found at 411.com.

The recent proposal by the governor of Connecticut requiring that these sites offer a blanket opt-out to residents likely won’t get legal traction. The Internet people finder databases and telephone directories already have opt-out procedures, and their information is gathered from government public records and published directories. Governor Rell has stated that this measure would address safety concerns for the elderly, who are often targeted in financial scams.

Nevada Supreme Court Schedules Public Hearing on Proposed Rules to Govern Sealing and Redacting of Court Records in Civil Cases.

Names of those arrested and detained in an immigration raid must be disclosed, as ordered by the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission. Documents were retained by the state’s Department of Public Safety, which made them subject to disclosure under the Connecticut open records law .

Washington State DOC to Seek Public Input in Development of New Electronic Disclosure Rules.

A Florida judge overruled a local school board in determining that the names of all school employees enrolled in the deferred retirement plan must be released under the state’s public records law.

Next month, Connecticut will remove “information identifying a party protected by a restraining order” from its Web site case lookup. This move is in response to a 2006 federal law prohibiting the disclosure of the identity of victims of domestic violence. In every county, this information will still be available in the county court case files.

Under a 2006 amendment to the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2005, no state, Indian tribe of territory “shall make available publicly on the Internet any information regarding the registration or filing of a protection order, restraining order, or injunction in either the issuing or enforcing State, tribal, or territorial jurisdiction, if such publication would be likely to publicly reveal the identity or location of the party protected under such order.”

I wonder if this mandate will impede efforts to identify restrained parties, such as San Diego County does in its unique database.

The State of Connecticut Judicial Branch is reviewing family law cases that were sealed before 2003 to determine which are eligible for a change in status, then publishing the list of cases. The court outlines its objective.

The plan calls for a review to determine: (1) whether the cases were properly designated as sealed; (2) whether the docket sheets, which set forth the chronology of the case, may be displayed on the Judicial Branch website; and (3) whether the motions and orders to seal the file may be made publicly available. At this point, there are approximately 500 of these cases statewide. Certain cases that have unique issues, including files that are unavailable pursuant to Practice Book Section 7-10, are not included in this phase of the review process, but those files will be addressed in a subsequent phase.

Teacher disciplinary actions finalized in 2007 are now at the Web site for the Florida Department of Education, Bureau of Professional Practices.

An Illinois appeals court ruled that employment contracts of state employees are public records.
Read the story
Read the case opinion, Jerry Reppert And The Gazette Democrat V. Southern Illinois University And Walter V. Wendler.

A Monterey County, California advocacy organization has appealed a ruling by a county judge who supported Monterey County’s denial of a public records request related to pending litigation. The organization wants to know how much money the county spending on land use litigation.

The Los Angeles County Superior Court has ruled that church personnel files of priests accused of molesting children may be released to the public, whether or not there was a criminal prosecution. The decision affects a small number of clergy but tips the balance in favor of the public right to know over privacy, which could affect many other cases.

Santa Clara County, California is continuing to fight a Superior Court determination that its GIS mapping should be easily available to the public at low cost. Meanwhile, Greenwich, Connecticut has assented to that state’s Supreme Court ruling and will post aerial photographs of the town on its Web site. Both government agencies used the specious defense that freely available geographic information systems maps were a security risk.

Folks in North Carolina may want to comment at the blog of a county Register who removed vital records from the Internet, then wrote about it.

The state police can demand lists of email activity conducted by a business if they deem it relevant to an investigation, according to an opinion by the Nebraska Attorney General. This includes “non content” records retained by providers of electronic communication services, such as ISP records of email headers, but not the email message.

Search the New York local civil court records by index number, party name, attorney/firm or judge. Some courts are online now and others will be added through the year.

Appeals filed with the Minnesota Supreme Court and the Minnesota Court of Appeals are now searchable online. More extensive information is available for cases filed after March 2003.

Connecticut criminal court dockets are online but only show the current day’s session. Search by court location or defendant to receive defendant status and charges. A search of criminal convictions is expected to be added within 6 months.

Not to be confused with the Connecticut Judicial Branch Task Force on Public Access, Governor Rell’s Commission on Judicial Reform has issued its final report. The Commission made recommendations on broadcast coverage of court proceedings and proposed opening “juvenile proceedings concerning abused, neglected, uncared for, and dependent children, and proceedings concerning the termination of parental rights.”

The Kansas legislature will entertain a bill to add those convicted of meth offences to a statewide registry.