"intelligence information" exemption applies to information identifying confidential sources or subjects in organized crime records; rejecting position that exemption applies to all information "reasonably related to criminal activity" on grounds that such an interpretation would "effectively exclude the law enforcement function of state and local governments from any public scrutiny"
How later courts described this case
- "intelligence information" exemption applies to information identifying confidential sources or subjects in organized crime records; rejecting position that exemption applies to all information "reasonably related to criminal activity" on grounds that such an interpretation would "effectively exclude the law enforcement function of state and local governments from any public scrutiny"
- conc, and dis. opn. of Bird, C. J.
- section 6255 allows agency to avoid providing redacted or segregated material if unduly burdensome
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
RICHARDSON, J., Concurring and Dissenting.
I concur in the majority opinion to the extent that it reverses that portion of the judgment below which required disclosure of the Law Enforcement Intelligence Unit index cards. I respectfully dissent, however, from the opinion insofar as it affirms the compelled disclosure of the Interstate Organized Crime Index printouts. In my view, both the index cards and the printouts are “intelligence information” which are absolutely exempt from disclosure under state law.
*455 Unlike the federal Freedom of Information Act ( 81 Stat. 54 ) and its broadly qualified exemption for various investigatory records (see ante, p. 448), the California Public Records Act (§ 6250 et seq. of the Gov. Code, to which all statutory references relate) on its face contains an absolute exemption for “records of intelligence information” of all state and local law enforcement agencies. (Id., § 6254, subd. (f).)
The computer printouts at issue here clearly constitute “records of intelligence information” within the meaning of the California act. As the majority explains, these printouts disclose the names, criminal records, physical characteristics, associates, occupations and residences of each person suspected of organized crime activities. Although the printouts are compiled from information contained in various public records, the printouts themselves are used exclusively by law enforcement agencies to assist in their investigations. The majority holds that only the “personal identifiers” contained in the printouts are exempt from disclosure, and it imposes upon the agency the task of excising such personal identifiers from the remaining, discoverable information.
The California act, however, does not call for, or authorize, the dis-. closure or segregation of the nonconfidential or nonpersonal portion of the intelligence records of law enforcement agencies. Instead, by its terms the act protects the records in toto. On the assumption that plaintiff ACLU is interested merely in the “types of information” gathered by law enforcement agencies, no reason appears why a blank form of printout would not suffice. As Justice Paras carefully explained in his opinion for the Court of Appeal in this case, “The [blank] forms, which defendants have not refused to provide, fully describe the ‘type of information’ involved. Anything more than that is the information itself, which would add nothing but specific data relating to specific people .... But the specific data placed into the blank spaces is beyond question ‘intelligence information,’ expressly excluded by section 6254, subdivision (f), from the scope of section 6253, subdivision (a).”
Agreeing with the foregoing reasoning, I would reverse the judgment in its entirety.