The American Civil Liberties Union is suing the Obama administration to force them to release records related to the deaths by drone attacks of three U.S. citizens in Yemen. The administration cited national security in denying the request for the documents under the Freedom of Information Act, but the ACLU said the drone program should [...]
In a narrowly tailored decision, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the public, media and same-sex marriage proponents could not gain access to the videotapes of the trial over Proposition 8. The court said that the trial judge had assured Prop 8 backers that the trial videotape would not be made public, [...]
The Hanford City Council has so far not released an anonymous packet of documents to the public and may never. The documents make allegations against city leaders which the council discussed in closed meetings. Jim Ewert, legal counsel for the California Newspaper Publisher Association, said the council may be on safe ground in denying public [...]
The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press did not like a federal appeals decision upholding a law restricting access to Virginia state records by non-residents. The court ruled that the restriction was not unconstitutional. The Reporters Committee felt the court should have considered the effect of the restriction on smaller journalistic enterprises. -db From [...]
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that non-residents have no right to Virginia public records under the state’s freedom of information law. Non-residents were challenging the law claiming it was unconstitutional. The two non-residents who sued the state were seeking child support documents and real estate tax assessment records. -db From The Reporters [...]
A federal district judge ruled that the FBI could not use a Freedom of Information Act exclusion in denying access to records about a civil rights era photographer who was an informant for the agency. The judge said the FBI confirmed the relationship with their response to the FOIA request so could not then withhold [...]
The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has sued the Justice Department and the FBI claiming that they refuse to release information on the FBI’s surveillance of citizens who have shown support for or interest in WikiLeaks. EPIC made the Freedom of Information Act complaint in federal court. -db From the Courthouse News Service, January 31, [...]
Two years after President Barack Obama ordered government agencies to come up to speed on declassifying 400 million pages of old records, there has been little progress. The failure to make more progress is a sign that the secrecy system considers itself immune from presidential orders, writes Steven Aftergood of Secrecy News. -db From a [...]
Long Beach and a police officers group are asking an appeals court to overturn a lower court ruling that the city must provide the names of officers involved in shootings. After a controversial shooting of an unarmed man in Long Beach in 2010, the Los Angeles Times asked the city to provide the identities of [...]
The Justice Department wants a federal judge to allow them to withhold photos of the death of Osama bin Laden on the grounds that releasing the photos could incite violence against the U.S. The DOJ disputed the arguments of Judicial Watch that making the photos public would cause harm to national security by revealing intelligence [...]
Safety Research and Strategies is suing the federal government for details of their investigation into the sudden acceleration of a Prius last year. Federal regulators have found no evidence that electronic systems were the cause of the unintended acceleration in Toyota vehicles, but Safety Research is not satisfied with that conclusion. -db From The New [...]
A Santa Monica math teacher lost a lawsuit in a California appeals court to keep a sexual harassment complaint against him private. The court found substantial public interest in the release of details of the investigation into a parent’s charge that the teacher sexually harassed his thirteen-year-old daughter. The charge was not fully substantiated. -db [...]
After tipsters told the Action Alameda News that the Alameda Police Department was trying to cover up a robbery at a restaurant in December of 2011, the newspaper made a public records request on the incident. The police denied that there was a coverup and denied access to 911 tapes saying that they were exempt [...]
A U.S. district judge will hear arguments on a challenge by the Sacramento Bee to the sealing of arguments in a legal dispute between the federal government and Sierra Pacific Industries over how a 2007 wildfire began and who should pay for the destruction. Sierra Pacific disputes the contention that the fire was sparked by [...]
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development will get another chance to protect the identity of informants in the investigation of a real estate kickback scheme in Hawaii. HUD had lost a round in an Hawaiian court when a three-judge panel said the agency failed to explain why it redacted the names of informants [...]
An agent for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration lost a ruling in federal appeals court when the court ruled that a video that went viral of his accidentally shooting himself during a public lecture did not violate the Privacy Act. The agent claimed that the video was part of an investigation into the shooting and [...]
A federal judge in Washington, D.C. found that the Justice Department could not withhold files from the nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics of their criminal investigation of U.S. Rep. Don Young of Alaska. The Justice Department did not file any charges against Young and withheld the files on privacy grounds. -db From the Anchorage [...]
A new House bill to block public access to publicly-funded research is nothing new. Efforts have been underway since 2008 to roll back the law that requires public access. The book publishing industry backs the bill claiming that the current policy of posting public funded findings online undercuts their business. From The Scientist, January 9, [...]
The Obama administration is no longer fighting a battle to avoid disclosing legal memos over plans to force local law enforcement to participate in Secure Communities, an immigration enforcement program. The administration also admitted that it gave a federal judge false information last year in one of the hearings on the case. -db From a [...]
California Senator Leland Yee of San Francisco intends to introduce a number of bills in 2012 to give the public greater access to the workings of their government. The bills include SB 1000 keeping the California Public Utilities Commission from withholding information about their regulation of PG&E responsible for a recent catastropic fire and SB [...]
The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that court documents in case brought by Apple against a maker of Mac computer clones were public. Apple claimed that the documents contained “compelling trade secrets” about the Mac OS X operating system. -db From The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, January 6, 2012, by [...]
The Anaheim City Attorney is investigating an e-mail sent by a planning department official ordering employees to purge unnecessary records at the risk of disciplinary action. The order came after the Voice of OC filed a California Public Records Act request for communications to and from city council members. -db From the Voice of OC, [...]
A federal district judge ordered the release of court records relating to a lawsuit brought by a hospital system alleging that another hospital group had conspired against them. The hospital system refused to release details of an agreement settling the case claiming that the information was confidential, containing vital business information about future plans. -db [...]
There were four cases over the Freedom of Information Act that promoted transparency in 2011 according to the Electronic Freedom Foundation. The cases were Milner v. Department of Navy, FCC v. AT&T, Islamic Shura Council of S. Cal. v. FBI and National Day Laborer Organizing Network v. ICE. From a commentary for the Electronic Frontier [...]
Tags: ACLU, Citizens United, EFF, FCC v. AT&T, FOIA, FOIA Exemption 2, immigrants Secure Communities, Milner v. Navy, National Security, NDLON v. ICE, privacy rights, Shura Council v. FBI, surveillance, Wired
The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. ruled that the CIA had the right to refuse to confirm or deny existence of records named in a Freedom of Information Act request. The refusal is called a Glomar response. The CIA had refused to provide information to a US. citizen seeking information on his [...]
A recent study found that under the Obama administration, in 2010 federal agencies used exemptions under the Freedom of Information Act 33 percent more than they did under George W. Bush in 2008. Watchdog groups are now trying to hold Obama to his pledge to make his administration the most transparent and accountable in history. [...]
The Central Intelligence Agency says it will now consider a Freedom of Information Act request for documents on Open Source Works, a new CIA open source intelligence division. An historian had asked for the charter of Open Source Works with the reply that the CIA could not confirm or deny the existence of the charter. [...]
A federal judge said the Environmental Protection Agency did not have to release studies about lingering oil in the Prince William Sound and the Gulf of Alaska, the site of the devastating Exxon Valdez spill over 21 years ago. Exxon Valdez had requested the information through the Freedom of Information Act. -db From the Courthouse [...]
Medicare is making its database of claims available to the public to allow assessment of doctors. A court ruling has blocked access to this information for decades. Critics of the release warn that the data could be easily misinterpreted in assessing doctors. -db From KSPR (ABC), December 5, 201, by Joanna Small. Full story
In a case brought by the Los Angeles Times, the Pasadena Sun and the Sacramento Bee, a Sacramento Superior Court judge ordered the California Assembly to release budget records under the California Public Records Act. Lawyers for the Assembly did not participate in oral arguments before the judge last week. -db From the Los Angeles [...]
A California appeals court ruled that a man who wanted to find out if he were registered in the Domestic Violence Restraining Order System could not have access under the Information Practices Act of 1977. A judge had earlier ruled that the registry was exempt under the California Public Records Act. -db From the Metropolitan [...]
WikiLeaks released the first documents of a massive cache of documents from contractors involved in surveillance. To make the release, WikiLeaks worked with two other nonprofits and with the media including the Washington Post. WikiLeaks said surveillance companies were invading personal computers and cell phones. -db From Mashable, December 1, 2011, by Stan Schroeder. Full [...]
The Courthouse News Service lost a round in court when a federal judge refused to hear a case over a court clerk’s delay in providing access to new civil actions. Courthouse News contended that the delays violated their free press rights in that by the time they received access, the cases were old news. The [...]
A Gawker reporter is suing the National Archives and Records Administration for information about how former President George W. Bush and his vice president, Dick Cheney tried to shape public opinion during their tenure. The reporter is not seeking the Bush administration documents protected under law from disclosure but rather the identities of those who [...]
A California research group says that government agencies trying to cope with budget shortfalls are resorting to increasing fees for copies of public documents in violation of the state’s Public Records Act. The act prohibits charges for retrieving public records to the costs of duplication. But Sacramento County charges $13 for page 1 and $3 [...]
State Senator Leland Yee of San Francisco will introduce a bill in January to repeal a law requiring a vote of the Pubic Utilities Commission before most records can be released to the public. Yee is sponsoring the bill after allegations that Pacific Gas and Electric was less than forthcoming with documents concerning the pipeline [...]
The Tennessee judge presiding over the lawsuit over the return of an adopted 9-year-old boy to Russia ruled that the court documents be unsealed. A court memo indicated that there were no facts presented to justify sealing the case and that the 9-year-old was living in Russia far from the harsh light of publicity about [...]
Tags: access to courts, Access to Records, adoption, closed courtrooms, confidentiality, international adoptions, juveniles, News Gathering, open records, privacy, Russia, sealed records, secret courts
The Los Angeles Unified School District is thwarting the public’s right to know how teachers rated in value-added evaluations saying that the disclosures would be “embarrassing and painful” to teachers. Parents have the right to know how students are faring under their teachers argues Jim Newton in an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times. -db [...]
A federal district court in California objected to the FBI’s practice of withholding information from the court whenever it thinks it serves the interest of national security. While the court said national security interests could justify withholding the information about targeting Muslim organizations from the Islamic Shura Council and its attorneys, it could not block [...]
The FBI has refused a Freedom of Information Act request for documents relating to the use of an inside informant on the work of Common Ground Relief, a group dedicated to Hurricane Katrina relief and critical of the Bush administration’s response to the disaster. The FBI said releasing the documents would violate the privacy of [...]
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