Freedom of Information Act - Federal Law Enforcement Officers

[1BRAVO9]

Jurisdiction

US Federal Law

Are the disciplinary actions (history) of federal law enforcement officers subject to FOIA or are they exempt?

I could understand it being heavily redacted, but I'm just curious about complaint and disposition.


Thank you in advance.

 

[Tax Counsel]

Are the disciplinary actions (history) of federal law enforcement officers subject to FOIA or are they exempt?

Most information in a federal employee's personnel file is exempt from disclosure under FOIA because of restrictions both in FOIA itself and in the federal Privacy Act of 1974. Unless the disciplinary action was public, e.g. the result of a court case, a member of the public is unlikely to get that information. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) is the agency that has oversight of release of federal government employee personnel records. Most of the employee's records are not subject to disclosure, including records of job performance appraisals. Under its regulations, the following is the information from an empoyees Official Personnel Folder (OPF) that is routinely subject to disclosure under FOIA:

§ 293.311 Availability of information.

(a) The following information from both the OPF and employee performance file system folders, their automated equivalent records, and from other personnel record files that constitute an agency record within the meaning of the FOIA and which are under the control of the Office, about most present and former Federal employees, is available to the public:

(1) Name;

(2) Present and past position titles and occupational series;

(3) Present and past grades;

(4) Present and past annual salary rates (including performance awards or bonuses, incentive awards, merit pay amount, Meritorious or Distinguished Executive Ranks, and allowances and differentials);

(5) Present and past duty stations (includes room numbers, shop designations, or other identifying information regarding buildings or places of employment); and

(6) Position descriptions, identification of job elements, and those performance standards (but not actual performance appraisals) that the release of which would not interfere with law enforcement programs or severely inhibit agency effectiveness. Performance elements and standards (or work expectations) may be withheld when they are so interwined with performance appraisals that their disclosure would reveal an individual's performance appraisal. ​

(b) The Office or agency will generally not disclose information where the data sought is a list of names, present or past position titles, grades, salaries, performance standards, and/or duty stations of Federal employees which, as determined by the official responsible for custody of the information:

(1) Is selected in such a way that would reveal more about the employee on whom information is sought than the six enumerated items, the disclosure of which would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy; or

(2) Would otherwise be protected from mandatory disclosure under an exemption of the FOIA. ​

(c) In addition to the information described in paragraph (a) of this section, a Government official may provide other information from these records (or automated equivalents) of an employee, to others outside of the agency, under a summons, warrant, subpoena, or other legal process; as provided by the Privacy Act (5 U.S.C. 552a(b)(4) through (b)(11)), under those Privacy Act routine uses promulgated by the Office, and as required by the FOIA.​

5 C.F.R. § 293.311.

In short, you are very unlikely to get the type of records you described. Like other citizens, federal employees have rights to privacy concerning the information that the federal government maintains about them. As a result, the information you get is pretty basic and not anything that would embarass the employee, subject him/her to harassment or violate the employee's basic rights to privacy under the Privacy Act.

 

[army judge]

Are the disciplinary actions (history) of federal law enforcement officers subject to FOIA or are they exempt?

I've provided you with these sites/resources which reveal the answers you're seeking.



https://www.washingtonpost.com/nati...8/white-house-police-accountability-database/


https://foiapac.ilag.gov/content/pdf/lawenfguide/FOIA_Guide_for_Law_Enforcement.pdf


https://www.justice.gov/oip/page/file/1324411/download

FOIA Exemptions & Exclusions

FOIA.gov - Freedom of Information Act: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-18-235r.pdf

https://www.justice.gov/oip/page/file/1324411/download

USOGE | FOIA Guide

Freedom of Information Act: Federal Court Decisions Have Not Required the Office of Special Counsel to Initiate Disciplinary Actions for the Improper Withholding of Records

The Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. § 552

Freedom of Information Act

Police misconduct: Discipline records for thousands of cops uncovered

Is Police Misconduct a Secret in Your State?

New police reform law exempts officer disciplinary records database from public disclosure

Frequently Asked Questions


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[1BRAVO9]

Thank you both very much Tax Counsel and Army Judge for expedient reply and the data provided.

I found this in the link to the PDF FOIA Guide for Law Enforcement that Army Judge provided.



Let me know if I'm reading this correctly.

I read it to state that disciplinary actions aren't subject to FOIA unless disciplined was imposed, or in other words if the investigation was found to be credible.

Again am I reading this correctly?

 

[Tax Counsel]

Thank you both very much Tax Counsel and Army Judge for expedient reply and the data provided.

I found this in the link to the PDF FOIA Guide for Law Enforcement that Army Judge provided.

View attachment 4555

Let me know if I'm reading this correctly.

I read it to state that disciplinary actions aren't subject to FOIA unless disciplined was imposed, or in other words if the investigation was found to be credible.

Again am I reading this correctly?

What records specifically are you trying to get? The subject line of your thread indicates that you are looking to get records of a federal government employee. If that's correct then the only way you may seek that information is under the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). I discussed that in my earlier. Some states, like Illinois have open records laws that they also call a Freedom of Information Act. The state FOIA only applies to seeking records held by state/local agencies. Each state and the federal government has its own rules for open records/FOIA requests. The FOIA guide for law enforcement you linked discusses the Illinois state FOIA law and the law enforcement referred to there are state and local law enforcement officials. It is of no use whatsoever if the person you want to know about was a federal law enforcement officer. Specifically, what agency did the person work for and what was his/her position? No names are needed to help you with this, so I suggest you not provide the person's name in this forum for privacy reasons.

For the federal government, each agency has its own FOIA site that outlines its procedures for FOIA requests and some allow you to do that online. The agency FOIA pages will also direct to their public internet pages that may already have the information that you need, which woudl eliminate the need fo a formal FOIA request. If I have the name of the agency I likely can provide you a link to the relevant page with that information. As I said before, for federal employees, including law enforcement officers, much of their personnel records are protected from disclosure under the federal Privacy Act and under FOIA exemptions relating to information about individuals that the agency has.

 

[1BRAVO9]

What records specifically are you trying to get? The subject line of your thread indicates that you are looking to get records of a federal government employee. If that's correct then the only way you may seek that information is under the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). I discussed that in my earlier. Some states, like Illinois have open records laws that they also call a Freedom of Information Act. The state FOIA only applies to seeking records held by state/local agencies. Each state and the federal government has its own rules for open records/FOIA requests. The FOIA guide for law enforcement you linked discusses the Illinois state FOIA law and the law enforcement referred to there are state and local law enforcement officials. It is of no use whatsoever if the person you want to know about was a federal law enforcement officer. Specifically, what agency did the person work for and what was his/her position? No names are needed to help you with this, so I suggest you not provide the person's name in this forum for privacy reasons.

For the federal government, each agency has its own FOIA site that outlines its procedures for FOIA requests and some allow you to do that online. The agency FOIA pages will also direct to their public internet pages that may already have the information that you need, which woudl eliminate the need fo a formal FOIA request. If I have the name of the agency I likely can provide you a link to the relevant page with that information. As I said before, for federal employees, including law enforcement officers, much of their personnel records are protected from disclosure under the federal Privacy Act and under FOIA exemptions relating to information about individuals that the agency has.

Thanks for the response.

Federal - Customs Border Protection

 

[Tax Counsel]

Thanks for the response.

Federal - Customs Border Protection

Customs and Border Protection (CBP)'s FOIA page allows you to make the request online, which will be the fastest way to get a response to your request. If you don't want your request to get bogged down and take forever to process, I recommend you specify as clearly as a possible the exact records you are looking for. A broad request, like "every document relating to employee Sam Smith" will take a lot of searching — and a whole lot of redaction — for the agency FOIA office to do, slowing things down a lot.