A judge has ruled in favor of former Columbus Mayor Kristen Brown in her lawsuit against the Columbus Police Department regarding a public records dispute.
In a ruling handed down on June 17 in Bartholomew County Superior Court 2, Special Judge Richard W. Poynter found that CPD’s response to a public records request by Brown regarding an incident involving a correction officer and his wife in a domestic dispute violated Indiana’s open records law.
More specifically, Poynter found that CPD’s response to the public records request failed to provide Brown with a copy of all information regarding the incident that was required to be made public, including “the factual circumstances surrounding the incident” and “a general description of any injuries, property or weapons involved.”
Poynter awarded Brown attorney’s fees, court costs and expenses incurred during litigation, but stopped short of finding that CPD intentionally violated open records laws or acted in bad faith. Brown said her attorney’s fees currently are about $45,000.
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The city is “still evaluating” if it will appeal the decision, city attorney Alan Whitted said. The city has until July 17 to appeal.
“I’m glad the judge finally ruled,” Brown said. “I never thought the city would fight so hard. I never expected it to reach the level of expense that it did.”
The dispute
The dispute between Brown and CPD started in September 2016, when Brown submitted a public records request about a domestic dispute that occurred on Aug. 23, 2016, according to the lawsuit. Brown said she filed the public information request on behalf of someone else whose request for the information allegedly was denied. Brown said it was easier for her to file the request because of her understanding of public-access laws and CPD’s operating procedures.
The Aug. 23 incident involved former jail commander Gary Myers and his then-wife Sabrina S. Myers, according to the public incident report. The report also lists that two vehicles were involved in the incident, one of which was owned by the sheriff’s department. No charges were filed related to the incident, according to court records.
On Sept. 26, 2016, Columbus Police Chief John Rohde responded to Brown’s request, providing an incident report that classified the incident as criminal mischief/vandalism and domestic disturbance and listed the weapon or tools involved in the incident as “other weapon.” No other factual circumstances or description of any injuries, property or weapons involved in the incident were disclosed at that time, the lawsuit states.
Four days later, Brown filed a formal complaint with Indiana’s public access counselor, alleging that the incident report provided to her did not meet the standards of two provisions of the Indiana Access to Public Records Act — Indiana Code 5-14-3-5(c)(3) — because it didn’t include “the factual circumstances surrounding the incident” and “a general description of any injuries, property or weapons involved.”
In response to the public access counselor, the city asserted, among other things, that it was not required to generate documentation about the Aug. 23 incident because nobody was arrested, summoned to court or jailed. Additionally, the city argued that the documentation the city provided was in compliance with the statute.
However, on Nov. 3, 2016, Luke Britt, Indiana’s public access counselor, issued an opinion in Brown’s favor.
“It is my opinion CPD’s attorney has misapplied the statute,” Britt wrote in his opinion, which is not legally binding. “Any alleged crime or infraction requires documentation of the factual circumstances surrounding the incident; and a general description of any injuries, property or weapons involved. …Factual circumstances must be more than just a list of suspected crimes.”
Brown informed Rohde on Dec. 7, 2016, that more than a month had passed since Britt had issued his opinion, according to the lawsuit, and she still had not received additional information. Brown filed suit in February 2017.
The documents were given to Brown in January 2018, Whitted said, after Poynter, the special judge appointed to the case, issued an order Dec. 11, 2017, for the city to provide them to her.
Poynter issued his decision 12 days ago, ruling in Brown’s favor.
“The court finds that the information CPD initially provided to Brown pursuant to her public records request in the Public Incident Report contained insufficient ‘information’ to meet the requirements of (the Indiana Access to Public Records Act),” Poynter wrote in the decision. “… Merely listing ‘Criminal Mischief/Vandalism’ and ‘Domestic Disturbance’ does not provide any factual evidence. There was no general description of any injuries, property or weapons involved. The only reference to any injuries, property or weapons involved was ‘other weapon,’ which is an insufficient description; nor was there any description of the property damage involved in the incident.”
Differing opinions
The city, for its part, has argued that CPD was following the same set of procedures that were in place during Brown’s administration and the information provided to Brown in 2016 “was sufficient to comply with the statute,” Whitted said.
“These were the procedures that had been put together during Mayor Brown’s administration in terms of how these incident reports would be prepared and completed,” Whitted said. “The police department was just continuing with the policies and procedures that Mayor Brown had put in place during that administration.”
When asked if there was any document that outlined any specific set of policies, procedures or guidelines established during Brown’s administration, Lt. Matt Harris, CPD spokesman, said he was unaware of any.
Whitted later clarified that he meant that the process used to handle Brown’s public information request was the same process in place during Brown’s administration, not that she personally instituted such a policy.
“That’s how (the police) had been doing it during the Brown administration,” Whitted said.
Brown, for her part, said the assertions that she had instituted any such policies or procedures during her tenure as mayor are false.
“My assumption when I was in office was that the police department was following the law,” Brown said. “We never implemented formally or informally any procedures for public access because the assumption was that they were following the law down there. I never received a complaint about public access, formally or informally, while I was mayor.”
Additionally, Whitted said the city attempted to settle with Brown on two separate occasions.
In May 2017, the city offered to pay $2,500 for Brown’s attorney fees and costs in exchange for a judgment that said, among other things, that CPD’s response to her public information request “was not adequate” under the Indiana Access to Public Records Act. The offer included what the city said were some factual circumstances and a general description of any injuries, property or weapons regarding the Aug. 23 incident, according to a copy of the offer.
On June 9, the city offered Brown $5,000 in attorney fees and costs, along with the same terms laid out in the previous offer.
Brown said she rejected the 2017 offers and then continued with the litigation after receiving in 2018 the information she had initially requested because “a judge still needed to rule on whether or not (CPD) had violated the (Indiana public records) law” and because she sought to recover attorney fees, which she said were, at that time, “substantially less than half than they are today.”
The parties have 60 days from June 17 to work out an agreement on attorney’s fees, court costs and expenses incurred during litigation, according to Poynter’s decision.
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"I’m glad the judge finally ruled. I never thought the city would fight so hard. I never expected it to reach the level of expense that it did."
— Former Columbus Mayor Kristen Brown
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