January 17, 2012

Ms. J. Middlebrooks

Assistant City Attorney

Criminal Law and Police Section

City of Dallas

1400 South Lamar

Dallas, Texas 75215

OR2012-00766

Dear Ms. Middlebrooks:

You ask whether certain information is subject to required public disclosure under the Public Information Act (the "Act"), chapter 552 of the Government Code. Your request was assigned ID# 443214 (DPD PIR# 2011-10052).

The Dallas Police Department (the "department") received a request for a report of a specified incident. You claim the requested information is excepted from disclosure under section 552.101 of the Government Code. We have considered the exception you claim and reviewed the information you submitted.

Section 552.101 of the Government Code excepts from disclosure "information considered to be confidential by law, either constitutional, statutory, or by judicial decision." Gov't Code § 552.101. This exception encompasses common-law privacy, which protects information that contains highly intimate or embarrassing facts, the publication of which would be highly objectionable to a reasonable person, and is not of legitimate concern to the public. See Indus. Found. v. Tex. Indus. Accident Bd., 540 S.W.2d 668, 685 (Tex. 1976). To demonstrate the applicability of common-law privacy, both elements of the test must be established. See id. at 681-82. The types of information considered to be intimate or embarrassing by the Texas Supreme Court in Industrial Foundation include information relating to sexual assault, pregnancy, mental or physical abuse in the workplace, illegitimate children, psychiatric treatment of mental disorders, attempted suicide, and injuries to sexual organs. Id. at 683. Generally, only highly intimate information that implicates the privacy of an individual is withheld. However, in certain instances where it is demonstrated the requestor knows the identity of the individual involved as well as the nature of certain incidents, the entire report must be withheld to protect the individual's privacy.

Although you contend the department must withhold all of the submitted information under section 552.101 on privacy grounds, we find this is not such an instance. Nevertheless, we agree some of the information at issue is highly intimate or embarrassing and not a matter of legitimate public concern. The department must withhold that information, which we have marked, under section 552.101 of the Government Code in conjunction with common-law privacy. The rest of the submitted information must be released.

This letter ruling is limited to the particular information at issue in this request and limited to the facts as presented to us; therefore, this ruling must not be relied upon as a previous determination regarding any other information or any other circumstances.

This ruling triggers important deadlines regarding the rights and responsibilities of the governmental body and of the requestor. For more information concerning those rights and responsibilities, please visit our website at http://www.oag.state.tx.us/open/index_orl.php, or call the Office of the Attorney General's Open Government Hotline, toll free, at (877) 673-6839. Questions concerning the allowable charges for providing public information under the Act must be directed to the Cost Rules Administrator of the Office of the Attorney General, toll free, at (888) 672-6787.

Sincerely,

James W. Morris, III

Assistant Attorney General

Open Records Division

JWM/em

Ref: ID# 443214

Enc: Submitted documents

c: Requestor

(w/o enclosures)

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