CFOIC’s holiday wish list
All we want for Hanukkah/Christmas/Kwanzaa (besides world peace, an end to the pandemic and less partisan rancor) are better open-government laws for Coloradans.
CCJRA
Zansberg: Rules of Professional Conduct ‘have nothing to say’ about disclosure of police body-cam footage
Footage from police body-worn cameras clearly fits the definition of criminal justice records in one of Colorado’s freedom-of-information laws: All materials, including recordings, “made, maintained, or kept” by criminal justice agencies. But some district attorneys are relying on more than the Colorado Criminal Justice Records Act to determine whether and when body camera video should be disclosed to the public.
Lawsuit: Autopsy report on decomposed body wrongfully withheld from requester
A Trinidad resident who runs a Facebook-based community news site is suing the Las Animas County coroner for wrongly denying his request for the autopsy report on a man whose decomposed body was found in an apartment in 2018.
Eight things to know about Colorado’s new law requiring disclosure of police internal affairs records
Gov. Jared Polis’ signature on House Bill 19-1119 unclogged a major blockage in the flow of public information in Colorado by establishing a statewide presumption of openness for records about the job performance of law enforcement officers. Here are some things to know about the bill, which went into effect immediately.
Senate committee advances bill that opens files on police internal affairs investigations
A Colorado Senate committee advanced legislation that would open records on completed law enforcement internal affairs investigations.
Video: CFOIC’s Zansberg talks about Sunshine Week and Colorado’s open government laws
Steve Zansberg, president of the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition, discussed Sunshine Week and CFOIC’s latest work Tuesday with Zack Newman, investigative data producer at 9NEWS.
After son’s death, a mother pushes for a Colorado law on disclosure of police body camera footage
The mother of a 19-year-old man who was killed during a confrontation with police last year is on a mission to make law enforcement body camera footage more available to the public under Colorado law.
Should you have to show an ID to request public records in Colorado?
Should you have to show identification to inspect or get copies of public records? Unlike a few states such as Virginia and Tennessee, Colorado has no requirement that freedom-of-information requests be made by people who actually live in the state. So what’s the point? Is it legal?
Amended House bill doesn’t open police internal affairs records, but encourages their disclosure
An amended bill endorsed by the Colorado House no longer opens records on police internal affairs files, but essentially encourages their disclosure once an investigation is complete.
Aurora agrees to change policies on police IA records, faces new suit on body cam footage
Aurora has agreed to revise its policies on the disclosure of police internal affairs records as part of a lawsuit settlement, but a new court case alleges the city wrongly withheld body-worn camera footage related to a traffic accident involving Denver Police Chief Robert White.