No. SB 744
Filed under Local Government.
Public Records Requests Made to Law Enforcement Officers; Prohibiting law enforcement officers from accepting and processing public records requests while engaged in certain activities; providing that a law enforcement officer makes a certain determination; requiring that a law enforcement officer verbally inform an individual of certain information; providing criminal penalties for individuals who knowingly and willfully persist in attempting to compel a law enforcement officer to accept and process a public records request under certain circumstances, etc.
Plain English Summary
AI-GENERATEDA law enforcement officer actively handling a call, an investigation, or other police duty may not accept or process a public records request made to them at that moment -- the officer must turn the requester away.
The officer alone decides whether they count as engaged in official duty. If so, they must say so out loud and send the requester to the agency's records custodian or online portal instead.
Anyone who keeps pushing the officer to take the request anyway, knowing they were redirected, commits obstruction of a law enforcement officer, a separate criminal offense.
None of this applies at the agency's own office. An officer handling duties at an official agency location must still accept and process records requests normally.
AIA law enforcement officer actively engaged in official duty -- a call for service, an investigation, or other official police activity -- may not accept and process a public records request made to them at that time.
AIWhether an officer counts as engaged in the performance of an official duty for this section is a determination made solely by that officer, with no outside standard, supervisor approval, or after-the-fact review named in the text.
AINone of these restrictions -- the bar on accepting requests, the redirect duty, or the criminal penalty for persistence -- apply to an officer performing official duties at an official location of the employing agency, such as its office.
AIWhen declining, the officer must tell the requester on the spot that the request cannot be accepted or processed at that time, and must direct them to the employing agency's records custodian or, if one exists, its official online public records portal.