The Gazette: On Monday, our state Supreme Court ruled that the database of peace officers (sheriff’s deputies and police officers) certified by the state’s Peace Officer Standards and Training Board (“POST”), a division within the Office of Attorney General, is a “criminal justice record,” not a “public record” subject to the Colorado Open Records Act.

The court so found on the narrow grounds that the head of POST is a former law enforcement officer and he investigates those suspected of “impersonating a peace officer” though not licensed to do so. The net result is that a database of records containing thousands of peace officers driving patrol cars on public streets and highways and walking in our midst armed with deadly force, can be withheld from public inspection, in its entirety, based on the essentially unreviewable opinion of the records custodian that disclosure would be “contrary to the public interest.”

And, in fact, that is what the records custodian in question, the Deputy Attorney General, testified under oath was her opinion. And, courts are powerless to second-guess her decision.

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