OPEN RECORDS: Tennessee sheriffs worst offenders of open records law

This is the fourth in a four-part series on the public's right to see public records in Tennessee.

By MARC PERRUSQUIA
The Commercial Appeal

MEMPHIS (AP) — All across Tennessee, from Memphis to Mountain City, sheriffs and police don't know the law that gives citizens the right to see crime reports.

High in East Tennessee's Appalachians, a woman seeking a report from the Johnson County Sheriff's Office in Mountain City has her driver's license seized. A background check finds nothing, yet a detective turns her away, saying reports aren't released "to just anybody."

Near the banks of the muddy Mississippi, a graduate student visiting the Shelby County Sheriff's Office in Memphis is told daily reports are unavailable; a three-day-old log is all they have.

In Nashville, the state capital, police say they need $33 to produce a report.

Law enforcement officers have a similar message in Jackson, Huntingdon, McMinnville, Jefferson City, Greenville and many other burgs along the state's 482-mile spine: Go away. These reports are confidential.

For nearly 50 years Tennessee law has guaranteed citizens the right to inspect public records, including crime reports, yet a statewide audit this month found more than a third of city police agencies and close to half of county sheriffs' offices failed to comply.

Thirty of 85 local police agencies surveyed — 35 percent - denied citizen requests to view crime reports.

The audit by the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government, a nonprofit watchdog group, found that 40 of 89 sheriffs' offices - 45 percent — denied requests.

"That's terribly disappointing," said Lucian Pera, a Memphis lawyer who has filed suits on behalf of The Commercial Appeal to open government records. "Those law enforcement officers are supposed to know what the law is, including the public records law."

For Pera, it's a no-brainer: The public needs access to records to ensure police accountability and to feel safe in their community. Basic information about crime traditionally has been open to the public, he said, long before the 1957 Open Records Act made it the law.

Police blotters — logs or indexes that briefly chronicle the day's crimes and disturbances — are part of that tradition. So are incident reports, documents that briefly summarize the time, place and particulars of a given burglary, car break-in, mugging, fight or other disturbance.

Yet, repeatedly, law enforcement officers told auditors they could not see such reports.

The auditors — reporters, students and others who volunteered _ made unannounced visits to law enforcement offices in all of Tennessee's 95 counties Nov. 2-4 and asked to see reports.

If asked who they were or why they wanted the record, auditors were instructed to ask if that was necessary to see it. If pressed, they would identify themselves first simply as a citizen and, if needed, as a reporter or student working on a project. This was done to see how agencies performed under the requirements of the state Open Records Act.

The law says that, with some exceptions, state, county and municipal records "shall at all times, during business hours, be open for personal inspection by any citizen of Tennessee."

In theory, citizens should be able to see a record right there, on demand, but the audit only recorded a document denied if they were told they would have to wait 48 hours or longer.

All over the state, auditors were denied access or put off. They received a variety of reasons.

One agency in West Tennessee claimed releasing any incident reports might pose a threat to homeland security.

A sheriff's deputy in Middle Tennessee had a simple answer when an auditor asked to see reports on vehicle break-ins: "We just don't do that."

Two leading reasons given for withholding records involved privacy concerns and claims the matter was under investigation.

Both those reasons came to play in intimidating fashion when auditor Doug Davis went to the Hickman County Sheriff's Department in Middle Tennessee asking to see a crime log and separate reports on a burglary and a theft.

He soon found himself surrounded by Sheriff Randall Ward and two detectives.

"They were in effect detaining me by taking my driver's license and holding me in a back room," Davis said later.

Davis, a reporter for The Daily News Journal in Murfreesboro, said that, in fairness, the detectives became antagonistic because he would not tell them who he worked for. He was allowed to see a crime log but never got the reports. Ward did not respond to three messages left at his office over three days.

Liset Marquez, a reporter for the Chattanooga Times Free Press, had a similar experience at the Sequatchie County Sheriff's Office in East Tennessee, where she asked to see the crime log for the past 24 hours.

An officer there wanted to know why, then asked for identification. Marquez, who recently moved here from out of state, handed over her California ID and Times Free Press badge, which were photocopied.

An officer there told her she couldn't see the records because they contained private information and were under investigation. "I asked why I couldn't see it and he then told me, 'Because it's the law,"' Marquez wrote.

Randal Lockhart, chief of detectives there, didn't respond to calls left at his office.

Tennessee law doesn't require a citizen to have a reason for looking at a record. The law does grant an exception that allows police to withhold records involving an ongoing investigation, but Pera said it's widely held that the exception applies to investigative reports, not the basic summary contained in the initial incident report.

Alan Johnson, a Nashville attorney, said state Attorney General opinions have condoned requiring some proof of Tennessee citizenship, such as a driver's license, but said officials at times go overboard.

If a citizen asks to see a police personnel file they can be required to produce personal details, including a home address and telephone number, but police shouldn't demand all that to see an incident report, said Johnson, who represents the open records coalition.

At times, lack of accommodation — not intent — seemed responsible for denial of access.

When Kim Morris visited the Shelby County Sheriff's Department seeking an up-to-date crime log, she was passed from office to office before Central Records hooked her up with a three-day-old log.

"I was on a wild goose chase," said Morris, a journalism graduate student at the University of Memphis.

Sheriff's spokesman Steve Shular, who has worked hard to improve public access, likened the incident to a missed opportunity.

"Someone should have directed them to me," he said. "Any citizen can make a request to the public affairs office and we'll get them the report that same day."

Marc Perrusquia is a reporter for The Commercial Appeal in Memphis. He can be reached at 901-529-2545 or perrusquia@commercialappeal.com.

The leading reasons police and sheriff employees gave for not releasing records

By The Associated Press

Among the leading reasons police and sheriff employees gave for not releasing records:

+ Record exempt or under investigation (20)

+ Supervisor unavailable (15)

+ Record unavailable (11)

+ Privacy concerns (7)

Do you need to have proof of ID to get open records?

By The Associated Press

As a practical matter, public records are open to any member of the public, but because the statute specifically mentions Tennessee citizens, legal opinions have held that agencies may ask for proof of citizenship, minimally a driver's license.

Citizens have the right to inspect police personnel files, but that requires production of specific personal details, including home and work phone numbers, and a home address.

Some sheriffs argue open records law is unreasonable

By LEON ALLIGOOD

The Tennessean

NASHVILLE (AP) — Loudon County Sheriff Tim Guider is president of the Tennessee Sheriff's Association. His office denied a request for a public record because the auditor was "vague as to who she was and what she wanted the information for."

Guider said he does not feel he violated the Public Records Act. He cited the example of a home security company that requested all the burglary reports for a period of time.

"Of course what they wanted to do was to solicit business. That's not our job. That's not our business. I don't think it would give us a good name giving out addresses and telephone numbers," Guider said.

"For someone to walk in off the street and to say, 'I want all the burglaries for the last month,' I'm not for that. I would be reluctant to speak for all the sheriffs on this particular question. Certainly we would want to abide by the law, but there needs to be a valid request and not just say, 'give me everything you've got.'"

Guider noted it is rare for someone other than a victim, their family or a suspect or the suspect's family to ever ask for an incident report.

"For somebody just walking in off the street wanting a burglary or any incident report, it's rare. In fact, I can't even think of one."

But Frank Gibson, executive of the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government, said that is not a valid reason to deny a public record.

"We have a 'Do Not Call' registry in Tennessee to protect people from unwanted telemarketing calls," said Gibson. "It's wrong to use the fact you don't approve of the way the information is being used. It's there so people can know about specific threats. You can hang up on a telemarketer."

Meanwhile, across the state in Crockett County, an auditor was told he could not get records because sheriff's department personnel did not know him. Even after the auditor identified himself as a reporter and his employment was confirmed with his editor in Paris, he was not allowed to get the information.

Sheriff Troy Klyce said his personnel were wrong not to fill the auditor's request.

"When I got back to the office I told them it really didn't matter that I wasn't there. I told them it didn't matter whether you can ID them or not. It's a public record," Klyce said.

The sheriff observed his staff needed training.

"We need to get everybody on the same page. A lot of them feel like someone's just hunting something, you know what I mean. They take it personal or something. I say, 'Look it's a public record; they can have it,' but apparently the message hasn't gotten through," Klyce said.

It was the second trip the reporter had made to the Crockett County sheriff's office. The records were later faxed to the auditor.