Archive for the ‘Massachusetts’ Category

The Colorado Secretary of State has removed UCC document images from the Web site until such time as the Social Security numbers are redacted. The Secretary of State intends to issue new UCC forms that will not include the option of listing Social Security numbers. The policy also suspends bulk electronic sales of the Department’s UCC database. Colorado joins California, which recently instituted the same measures, along with Oregon, Mississippi, Missouri and a half dozen other states

In favorable public records’ news, the Oregon Secretary of State has expanded their online Business Registry Database, adding a search by individual name of Agent, Partner, Manager, President and Secretary.

The Vermont Secretary of State has introduced a “Right To Know” database of resources and laws related to Vermont public records. Search by statutory language, an agency or department’s name, exemption category or exemption and agency.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decided that Board of Bar Overseers and Office of Bar Counsel are judicial agencies which are exempt from the public records provisions. Only documents held by government agencies within the executive branch are subject to the public records act.

Massachusetts criminal show cause hearings will remain closed, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial decided.

Many police departments are incorporating online crime and traffic maps into their public safety efforts. Some enterprising folks (New York, Chicago, Boston, and more) gather the data from public agencies and post their own mapping program. Here are a few new additions:

The Tulsa, Oklahoma, Police Department displays current accidents on a map, and lists live calls for service, including address.

The Manteca Police Department, in California, has just put a crime
mapping program online, which provides a visual display of crime activity by general neighborhood. No specific address or name searching is available.

I previously wrote about a site that attempts to collect links to all the agencies with online crime mapping.

The methods that HP contractors used to secure telephone call logs, “the pretext story”, repeated ad infinitum, has reporters looking for new approaches to this story. The San Jose Mercury News has posted the transcript of a call to Verizon Wireless from 1st Source Information Specialists. It’s an odd selection for an example of a pretext from an information broker since no personal information appears to have been released. Perhaps Verizon’s interest in providing the telephone conversation text is to bolster their position that they are taking effective measures to foil non subscriber access to accounts.

The investigation of the Hewlett-Packard contractors who secured the telephone call logs of phone numbers registered to reporters and HP directors is revealing footprints in Florida, Massachusetts and Iowa, which could lead to investigations and prosecutions by those states Attorneys General.

Meanwhile, the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce sent a letter to Hewlett-Packard
requesting that the company turn over documents listing employees and contractors involved in the leak probe, and “a list of all individuals or entities whose telephone records or other personal consumer information were procured…” The letter specifically requested that no telephone records be provided. I guess the House committee doesn’t want that to become a public record.

A Non-Computer Lawyer’s Guide to Investigation on the Internet, a portal to investigator guides and useful links, particularly for criminal defense investigators, is hosted by a Massachusetts Public Defender. Some of the material is limited and there are dead links, but much of the information leads to valuable resources. Forensics materials include, New York State Department of Health, Guidelines for Determining Brain Death.

The Eyewitness Identification Research Laboratory, at the University of Texas, produced a 2006 study, in conjunction with various Illinois law enforcement agencies, Report to the Legislature of the State Of Illinois: The Illinois Pilot Program On Seqential Double-Blind Identification Procedures.

Find hospitals by state, town or name.

A Massachusetts Supreme Court opinion expands the scope of reciprocal discovery in criminal trials to encompass interviews of prosecution witnesses conducted by the defense where material is uncovered that might be used for impeachment. The opinion outlines the trial court case circumstances that lead to the Supreme Court’s involvement.

The defendant later filed a motion for additional discovery, seeking the names of all the Commonwealth’s prospective trial witnesses and an opportunity to inspect all documentary and physical evidence that the Commonwealth intended to offer at trial. A Superior Court judge allowed the motion, contingent on the defendant providing the same discovery to the Commonwealth, and limiting the obligation to such evidence that pertained to each party’s case-in-chief.

Subsequently, the Commonwealth filed a motion for additional reciprocal discovery. In its motion, the Commonwealth sought, among other requests, the disclosure of any written or recorded statement of any prospective witness, including potential witnesses for the Commonwealth, that the defendant intended to offer at trial for any purpose, including for impeachment.

The New York Times article notes that Massachusetts is often a legal trend setter, which could lead to broader adoption of this expansive view of reciprocal discovery beyond the three states that currently have it in place: New Jersey, Minnesota and New York.

The Massachusetts Supreme Court has ruled that the police reports of the Harvard University Police Department are not public records.

The Court also rejected The Crimson’s claims that private entities, once endowed with certain state powers, become public entities. Instead, the Court held that even when granted special powers, HUPD does not become “an agency of the commonwealth such that it becomes subject to the mandates of the public records law.”

This determination runs counter to an Indiana Court of Appeals decision that the retention of records by a private entity related to government agency business are public records.

Surely the authorization accorded to any police agency to arrest falls within the public purview.

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