Archive for the ‘Vermont’ Category

(Special contribution by Michael Sankey of BRB Publications, Inc.)

Effective July 1, 2008, significant changes are scheduled to take place in Vermont regarding criminal record access at the courts, from the Vermont Criminal Information Center (VCIC), and what will be reported on the VCIC record. These changes are triggered primarily from passage of Senate Bill 246.

Currently, the court fee for a criminal record search at a Vermont county district court is $10.00. Effective July 1, the fee will increase to $30.00 (per county search). Copy fees and certification fees will remain the same.

Currently, the fee for a criminal record search at the VCIC is also $10.00. Currently records are essentially released only to two public groups; the subject; to an employer but only if a conditional offer of employment is made.

Effective July 1, the fee for the state VCIC search will be $20.00 and the restrictions will be removed; records will be open to the public. The fee will increase again in July 2009 to $25.00. Currently all VCIC record requests must be made manually, but there are plans by the VCIC to have Internet access in place by December 2008.

However, there is an important caveat regarding what data will be reported by VCIC as of July 1st. Per the new law, the data reported on the VICI record will be restricted to only include the name, DOB, date of conviction, type of conviction, and offense level. The location of the court, the case docket number, and arrest-only records will not be shown. Thus, if there is a question on the name, a name variation, or common names with possible identical DOBs, one must pay the $30 search fee at each county district court searched to find the docket number in order to access the document file. Only 2 of Vermont’s 14 counties provide public access terminals – Chittenden and Rutland – which may provide a docket look-up.

The Vermont Administrative Office of the Courts and the people at VCIC are sympathetic to the problem. The VCIC has stated they will do everything possible to help narrow down the false positives. They predict a 5-day turnaround time to complete a search.

To view the legislation, go to a Senate Bill 246 (S.246).

What do you think about these changes?
Jimmie Mesis, Editor-in-Chief
PI Magazine

The Colorado Board of Medical Examiners is expanding the range of information on doctors at its site. This data on new licensees is expected to be posted April 2008, but will only be gathered and posted for current licensees in 2009.

The following information will be disclosed:

* Name
* Aliases
* Current Address
* Telephone number
* Information regarding all medical licenses ever held
* Current Board Certifications
* Practice Specialty (ies)
* Affiliations with hospitals and health care facilities
* Current ownership interests in businesses
* Current employment contracts
* Public disciplinary actions against a medical license
* Agreements and Stipulations to temporarily cease medical practice
* Involuntary hospital or health care facility privileging actions
* Involuntary surrender of a DEA registration
* Criminal convictions or plea arrangements for felonies and crimes of moral turpitude
* Judgments, settlements and arbitration awards for medical malpractice claims
* Refusal by an insurance carrier to issue medical liability insurance

The Nevada Supreme Court has adopted rules for redacting and sealing court records. The court may order a file sealed or redacted for “identified compelling privacy or safety interests that outweigh the public interest in access to the court record.” The identity of the person who filed the motion to seal the court record must be recorded and kept a public record.

The Vermont Health Department is beginning the process of removing Social Security numbers from death certificates. In addition, proposed legislation would remove the cause of death from death certificates. Another bill would bar the posting of court cases on the Internet. Read all about it.

The New York Court of Appeals supported the private real property data vendor, Data Tree, in its quest to secure an electronic version of property records. New York Court of Appeals Rejects Reporters Committee Rationale, Access Reports, December 20, 2007.

The Minnesota Association of County Officers is seeking the participation of Minnesota county Recorders to create an online marriage index database.

Vermont real property tax forms are now sent to Vermont town clerks rather than the homeowner, which makes this form a public record. These documents list the amount of tax reductions given to homeowners based on income, enabling one to estimate a household’s income.

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.

You may have noticed that there’s a trend toward eliminating personal identifiers – social security numbers, dates of birth and addresses – from all public records. Any publicly filed documents containing social security numbers are subject to being altered, removing the SSN identifier, or rejected until the personal information is redacted. Currently, financial records, tax liens, deeds and mortgage loan documents are being changed to the extent that it will become impossible to verify whether a federal, state or municipal tax lien belongs to a particular individual.

Fraud investigators, people finders, heir locators, financial lenders and journalists checking on the fitness of our politicians all rely on the unique identifier to develop background and verify identity.

The complete social security number is being removed from filed documents, not just from the Internet indexes and images. And guess what? The commercial databases aren’t going to be able to provide search results that cross reference SSNs on tax liens or judgments filed with county recorder’s offices with a name or address. The indexes of the data resellers are only as good as the original records.

The Missouri Secretary of State just announced that she’s removed the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) document images from the Web site.

The Secretary of State’s Office is taking every step possible to protect personal identification information (Social Security Numbers and Federal Identification Numbers) while continuing to provide service to our customers. As part of that effort, our office has temporarily removed Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) images from the web site as they may inadvertently contain personal identification information.

Although the Virginia legislature has yet to enact a pending bill that would remove SSNs from land records and court filings, Nevada county recorders are rejecting filings that contain social security numbers. This new requirement has created a mess in the courts because the County Clerk is required to submit affirmations that the “5,000 documents filed every day in District Court” have the social security numbers removed. Even in the relatively lower volume state of Vermont the county clerks are overwhelmed by the mandate to extract SSNs from previously submitted documents. The Kansas legislature apparently didn’t consider the costly (both personal and financial, to government and business) consequences of redacting data, declaring that

Unless required by federal law, no document available for public inspection or copying shall contain an individual’s social security number if such document contains such individual’s personal information.

Personal information is name, address, phone number or e-mail address. This applies to

documents recorded in the official records of any recorder of deeds of the county or to any documents filed in the official records of the court and shall be included, but not limited to, such documents of any records that when filed constitutes:
(1) A consensual or nonconsensual lien;

(2) an eviction record;
(3) a judgment;
(4) a conviction or arrest;
(5) a bankruptcy;
(6) a secretary of state filing; or
(7) a professional license.

Humm, no name on a professional license…

All of the 50 state governments will eventually succumb to this “identity theft” protection measure on court records, UCC filings and mortgage loan documents.

Why don’t these state legislatures follow the federal model, masking only part of the SSN, which achieves the aims of fraud prevention while keeping the unique association of the number with a name?

The Vermont Criminal Information Center is now providing statewide criminal history checks to all employers, in accordance with a change in the state law. Requests for criminal conviction history must mailed and include an authorization from the applicant. Increased ease of access to criminal records will relieve employers from searching each of Vermont’s county courts.

Virginia is expanding the types of correctional facilities that will be included in the Victim Information and Notification Everyday (VINE) program. Over the next two years, information on criminal offenders incarcerated at jails will be added to the VINE Web site, which already lists prisoners in state facilities.