Monday’s state supreme court ruling changed that.
The majority opinion written by Justice William Hood states that the phrase “specific, identifiable incident” in the bill’s language “refers to the types of incidents subject to investigation, not who must identify those incidents as part of a request to inspect investigation files.”
The requestor does not need to identify an incident in their request, the ruling states, and a law enforcement agency “may not deny a request” simply because “the requesting party has not identified a specific incident of misconduct.”
In the case considered by the Colorado Supreme Court, the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office denied a request by the defendant s attorney for all internal affairs records that related to two deputies involved in her case because the request did not specify an incident involving the officers.
Colorado Supreme Court Expands Access To Internal Police Probes
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Colorado Supreme Court opens up more police internal affairs reports
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