No. CS/HB 627
Filed under Local Government.
Pub. Rec./Law Enforcement Officers Actively Engaged in Official Duty; Authorizes certain law enforcement officers to decline to accept or process public records requests; provides requirements for such officers; provides penalty.
Plain English Summary
AI-GENERATEDA law enforcement officer who is actively handling a call, an investigation, or another official duty may refuse to accept or process a public records request from anyone who approaches them at that moment.
The officer alone decides whether they qualify as actively engaged in duty. If they decline, they must tell the requester on the spot and point them to the agency's records custodian or its records portal.
Someone who keeps trying to force the officer to take the request after being redirected commits resisting an officer without violence, a criminal offense, so long as they know what they are doing and mean to compel compliance.
The refusal applies only to that encounter. A requester can still submit the same request afterward through the agency's normal custodian channel or portal.
AIA law enforcement officer actively engaged in an official duty -- a call for service, an investigation, or any other official law enforcement activity -- may refuse to accept or process a public records request made to them at that moment.
AIWhether an officer counts as actively engaged in official duty for this section is a determination made by that same officer, with no outside standard, supervisor approval, or after-the-fact review named in the text.
AIA person who knowingly and willfully keeps trying to force an on-duty officer to accept or process the request after being redirected commits resisting an officer without violence, a criminal offense.
AIWhen declining, the officer must tell the requester on the spot that the request cannot be accepted or processed right then, and must direct them to the agency's records custodian or, if one exists, its official public records request portal.