In 2008, two of Sarah Palin's personal Yahoo email accounts were hacked, revealing the existence of correspondence with other government officials like Alaska's Lieutenant Governor and even California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger outside any sunshine record-keeping requirements of the state government. Palin was eventually cleared of any wrong-doing with the account, despite the account being deleted before the investigation even started.
In what feels like the discovery of another tip of the same iceberg, ProPublica has a report about the Cuomo administration's adoption of similar tactics in New York.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday May 06 2014, @06:37PM
So what?
Police communications are specifically exempted [rcfp.org] from public records laws in most states.
Official actions, such as arrests, citations, detentions, etc. are open, but communications between officers and even between departments are always exempted via disclosure would endanger the successful
completion of an investigation, or endanger witnesses or endanger officers exceptions. Check the link for state by state details.
Investigation documents are almost always exempt, even after the case is closed. Just revealing the names of someone who talked to the police could get that person killed.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday May 06 2014, @07:25PM
While your point is valid, it doesn't mean that those records should not be made, and that they should not be possible to be subpoenaed for court records. Redaction should be at the discretion of the judge. The fact that the laws are as you state is one reason there's so much corruption...and they were probably written that way to facilitate corruption already in place.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday May 06 2014, @08:47PM
You assume that the conversation was about official business, rather than the weekend fishing trip, and therefore you expect every police officer's phone calls to be recorded and available for any sympathetic judge to release.
Would YOU work under such conditions?
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 07 2014, @07:09AM
Nobody is forcing them to be policemen. Just saying.