Arizona Supreme Court Rules Electronic Information Subject to Records Requests
From Sunshine Review
[edit] October 29, 2009
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Tuscon, AZ On October 29, 2009, the Arizona Supreme Court delivered a landmark FOIA decision in Lake v. City of Phoenix, determining that electronic "metadata", like creation dates and time stamps of electronic files, are subject to the same records laws as the documents themselves. The decision came about as a result of a public records request made by a police officer for filed performance reports.
[edit] Case history
David Lake, in pursuing a federal employment discrimination lawsuit, requested a number of documents from the police department, including performance review notes. The department met Lake's request by issuing him paper copies of the documents requested. However, upon examining the documents, Lake felt that they had been motified so as to alter the dates and times the notes were filed. Lake submitted a new reqest, seeking the creation dates and time stamps of the documents in question. The decision as to whether or not that information constituted public records went all the way to the Supreme Court. [1]
[edit] Impact on FOIA
This case presents an interesting new problem for FOIA laws catching up with the electronic age. The courts determined that despite the lack of clear statutory permission for the release of metadata, the content fell under the clear intention of the laws. Judge Bales stated that
"It would be illogical, and contrary to the policy of openness underlying the public records laws, to conclude that public entities can withhold information embedded in an electronic document, such as the date of creation, which they would be required to produce the same information if it were written manually on a paper public record,” [1]
[edit] See also
[edit] External Links
- Supreme Court of Arizona, Ruling of the Court
- Arizona Capitol Times, "AZ high court: Public records include electronic data"
- Tuscon Citizen, "Electronic documents are public records, court rules"
- Yumasun, "Court rules electronic data is public record"
- Leagle, Ruling of the Court
- Jurist, "Lake ruling addressed access to electronic records but left work for Arizona legislature" Editorial
[edit] References
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