Archive for the ‘Florida’ Category

The citizenry and government both come to the wrong conclusions about the ready availability of public records on the Internet. The City of Raleigh, North Carolina and Wake County joined dozens of other communities that have begun integrating crime activity into interactive mapping. Local real estate developers and agents object, believing that “public crime data… will lower housing prices.” Some people are getting acquainted with the meaning of “public records” for the first time through the government Web sites, complaining about an invasion of privacy because others can see their address and name in the Assessor’s records. Alternatively, they embrace access when the records concern people they want to know about, such as sex offenders. Privacy advocates have campaigned to seal criminal records for first-time offenders, which Florida is doing at 3 times the number as 10 years ago, according to this analysis. Even in these cases, law enforcement continues to keep a record of the criminal history.

Public officials sometimes sound defensive when bringing public records into the Internet age, asserting that particular types of personal information isn’t included. Or they remove the documents or data that was once on the Web, as in the case of the El Paso County, Colorado inmate log. The Sheriff has restricted the listing of the criminal charges to classification numbers as a reaction to inmate assaults. If the availability of public records on the Internet isn’t mandated by law, as in the case of the sex offender registries, it’s always subject to being withdrawn.

Agencies could better serve the goal of open government by reducing the number of exemptions to disclosure. The Washington State Attorney General announced a meeting to review the Public Disclosures Act exemptions, which have grown from 10 in 1972 to more than 300 today.

The County Clerk of Oneida County, New York removed land records from its Web site, a promise of her political campaign. Now, she proposes to make document images available online to a handpicked elite, including attorneys (to whom she was speaking when this offer was made), ostensibly because the records are used in the course of their work. You see the basis for redefining the “public” in “public records”, right? Arbitrary. Capricious. Preferential.

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.

A change in state law now enables the Arkansas State Police to release criminal history reports to anyone who has a signed release from the subject. Reports are available for a fee, instantaneously, through the Online Criminal Background Check System.

The Florida Bar has integrated attorney disciplinary actions into its online profiles of attorneys. Documents of recent actions can be viewed but all older cases (3000+) have yet to be scanned. This article describes the type of records available.

Lawyers who have received an admonishment, reprimand, suspension, or disbarment (including resignations for disciplinary reasons) in the prior 10 years will have that information noted on their biography page of the Bar’s Web site.

The site requires a search by name to identify disciplinary actions. A hit returns a description of actions taken and a file number. On recent 2007 closed cases, the file number will link to images. The results look like this:

A search on “disciplinary actions” within the Florida Bar News returns a list of links by date of filings since 2002. Add an individual name and get the Bar News reports on that attorney.

The Coral Gables Police Department has a searchable database of vehicle accident reports and incident reports. Search accident, arrest or incident events by location, name, report number or date. A sortable list is returned with date, type of contact, location and whether an report image is available. Report images are available for accidents and incidents but not arrests. But arrests at a particular location may have been proceeded by an incident involving the same subject, for which a report image would be online. Name of contacted individuals are listed. See image example.

Finally, the Florida Supreme Court has addressed the practice within some county trial courts of removing certain dockets and files from public view. From AP:

The Florida Supreme Court issued emergency rules Thursday designed to stop the improper sealing of court records and dockets in civil cases, but delayed a decision on whether they also should cover criminal cases.

The unsigned, unanimous opinion requires court clerks to post notices on their Web sites and courthouses after a record is sealed, and allows citizens to then challenge those decisions. Courts are also prohibited from making case, docket and other identifying numbers confidential.

The New Jersey Courier-Post has added statewide New Jersey Superior Court Criminal Conviction Records to its collection of public records databases, called DataUniverse. The collection of DataUniverse databases include some private investigators frequently use: New Jersey Death Index, Department of Corrections inmates, real property ownership, state employees and disciplinary records of doctors. As always, check the source material, don’t assume these records are inclusive or accurate.

Media organizations have charged ahead developing databases of public records, often of indexes and documents the government has not released or developed. The Florida Herald Tribune Teacher Misconduct Database is built from court records and administrative complaints filed with the Education Practices Commission against teachers for various types of misconduct. Searchable by name or location, the site returns a summary of the matter and copies of documents. The data covers 1997 – 2005. The state is scrambling to develop its own online database, a good outcome of the Herald Tribune project. The Florida government site may be available sometime in 2007.

Reported in Lucas Grindley.