In 2022, the Akron Beacon Journal submitted multiple public records requests to the City of Akron and the Akron Police Department, seeking information related to three separate lethal use-of-force incidents involving Akron police officers.
The first incident occurred on December 23, 2021, when police were called to a home where James Gross was breaking into his estranged wife’s residence. Officers found Gross holding a knife to his wife’s neck and fatally shot him. The second shooting occurred shortly after, involving an armed man named Lawrence Rodgers who was threatening another man. Rodgers was shot by police after he refused orders to drop his weapon, but not before he shot and killed the other man. The third incident, and the one garnering the most attention, involved the shooting of Jayland Walker on June 27, 2022. Police officers shot and killed Walker after believing he had fired a gun from his car during a vehicular pursuit. Eight officers fired their weapons at Walker.
In response to the newspaper’s requests, the City provided some records but consistently redacted the names of the police officers involved in all three incidents. The newspaper sought various records related to these incidents, including incident reports, personnel files, discipline records, and internal investigation files for specific officers and all officers under investigation relating to the shootings. The City provided administrative leave and reinstatement notices but redacted the officers’ names. It declined to provide records related to the personnel files, discipline records, and internal investigations of officers involved in the Gross and Rodgers shootings.
For the Walker shooting, the newspaper requested 911 recordings, the incident report, supplemental notes of the investigating officers, witness statements and narratives, the personnel files of officers placed on administrative leave pending investigation, and body-worn camera footage of the responding officers directly involved in the incident. The City provided an incident report, again without identifying the officers, and later produced personnel records of eight officers placed on administrative leave, but with the officers’ names redacted. The City justified redacting the officers’ names by claiming that releasing the information would endanger their lives and physical safety, potentially leading to serious bodily harm or death. In November 2022, the Akron Beacon Journal initiated a mandamus action, seeking a court order compelling the City to produce the requested records without redacting the officers’ names.
The Supreme Court of Ohio granted the writ in part and denied it in part. “We conclude that the requests for the personnel files, discipline records, and internal investigations of unidentified officers were improper public records requests. This is not a situation in which the request identified the person whose records were sought.” The Court reasoned that these requests were tantamount to asking for the officers’ names, which the Court considered a request for information rather than a request for specific records. The Court further elaborated, “There is no difference between asking for the names of officers involved in the shooting and requesting the personnel files, discipline records, and internal investigation records of the officers involved in the shooting. In both instances, the newspaper was requesting information – the names of the officers involved in the shootings.”
However, the Court found that the requests for administrative leave or reinstatement notices and the incident report related to the Walker shooting were proper public records requests. Therefore, the Court addressed whether the City had a legal basis to redact the officers’ names from the incident reports, analyzing it under two exceptions to the public record laws.
The Court held that the City properly redacted the names of the eight officers involved in the Walker shooting based on the confidential law enforcement investigatory records exception in R.C. 149.43(A)(2). The Court reasoned that the officers qualified as “uncharged suspects” under R.C. 149.43(A)(2)(a) because the shooting had been investigated by the Ohio Attorney General, was presented to a grand jury which did not indict, and that a federal investigation was still possible. Thus, the eight officers were criminally investigated and remain uncharged, making them “uncharged suspects” for purposes of R.C. 149.43(A)(2)(a).
The Court further elaborated on this point: “The parties do not dispute that incident reports of the Walker shooting contain the names of the eight officers who were criminally investigated but not indicted. Indeed, obtaining the officers’ identities is the reason that the Beacon Journal sought the reports, and preventing that discovery is the reason that the City has redacted the reports. The eight officers fit the definition of ‘uncharged suspects’ under R.C. 149.43(A)(2) (a). To the extent the supplemental incident reports include the eight officers’ names, we conclude that the supplemental incident reports have a high probability of disclosing – in fact, they are certain to disclose – the identities of uncharged suspects.” Therefore, the City was obligated to redact those names.
The Court then considered, regarding the Gross and Rodgers shootings, the City’s primary justification for redacting the officers’ names was the argument that the officers’ names would endanger their lives or physical safety and found that “the evidence presented in this case with regard to the perceived threats made against the officers involved in the Gross and Rodgers shootings” did not rise to a level justifying redaction of their names.
State ex rel. Copley Ohio Newspapers, Inc. v. City of Akron, 2024 Ohio LEXIS 2767 (Ohio 2024).