November 5, 2012

Ms. Katie Lentz

Open Records

Williamson County Sheriff's Office

508 South Rock Street

Georgetown, Texas 78626

OR2012-17672

Dear Ms. Lentz:

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# 470334.

The William County Sheriff's Office (the "sheriff's office") received a request for all of the requestor's arrest and booking records during a specified period of time. You claim portions of the submitted information are excepted from disclosure under section 552.101 of the Government Code. We have considered the exception you claim and reviewed the submitted representative sample of information. ⁽¹⁾

Initially, we note the requestor has specifically excluded from his request fingerprints, social security numbers, Texas driver's license numbers, Texas license plate numbers, and vehicle identification numbers. Thus, these types of information are not responsive to the request. This ruling does not address the public availability of any information that is not responsive to the request, and the sheriff's office need not release any such information.

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. Section 552.101 encompasses laws that make criminal history record information ("CHRI") confidential. CHRI generated by the National Crime Information Center or by the Texas Crime Information Center is confidential under federal and state law. CHRI means "information collected about a person by a criminal justice agency that consists of identifiable descriptions and notations of arrests, detentions, indictments, informations, and other formal criminal charges and their dispositions." Id. § 411.082(2). Title 28, part 20 of the Code of Federal Regulations governs the release of CHRI obtained from the National Crime Information Center network or other states. See 28 C.F.R. § 20.21. The federal regulations allow each state to follow its individual law with respect to CHRI it generates. Open Records Decision No. 565 at 7 (1990). See generally Gov't Code ch. 411 subch. F. Section 411.083 of the Government Code deems confidential CHRI the Texas Department of Public Safety ("DPS") maintains, except DPS may disseminate this information as provided in chapter 411, subchapter F of the Government Code. See Gov't Code § 411.083. Sections 411.083(b)(1) and 411.089(a) authorize a criminal justice agency to obtain CHRI; however, a criminal justice agency may not release CHRI except to another criminal justice agency for a criminal justice purpose. Id. § 411.089(b)(1). Thus, any CHRI obtained from DPS or any other criminal justice agency must be withheld under section 552.101 of the Government Code in conjunction with Government Code chapter 411, subchapter F. We note section 411.083 does not apply to active warrant information or other information relating to an individual's current involvement with the criminal justice system. See id. § 411.081(b) (police department allowed to disclose information pertaining to person's current involvement in the criminal justice system). Upon review, we find the Federal Bureau of Investigation ("FBI") number the sheriff's office has marked constitutes CHRI generated by the FBI which must be withheld pursuant to section 552.101 of the Government Code in conjunction with section 411.083 of the Government Code and federal law. However, the sheriff's office has failed to demonstrate how any portion of the remaining information it has marked constitutes CHRI for the purposes of chapter 411 or federal law. Therefore, the sheriff's office may not withhold any of the remaining information at issue under section 552.101 of the Government Code on this basis. As you raise no other exceptions to disclosure, the remaining responsive information must be released. ⁽²⁾

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,

Michelle R. Garza

Assistant Attorney General

Open Records Division

MRG/som

Ref: ID# 470334

Enc. Submitted documents

c: Requestor

(w/o enclosures)

Footnotes

1. We assume the "representative sample" of records submitted to this office is truly representative of the requested records as a whole. See Open Records Decision Nos. 499 (1988), 497 (1988). This open records letter does not reach, and therefore does not authorize the withholding of, any other requested records to the extent those records contain substantially different types of information than those submitted to this office.

2. Because this requestor has a special right of access to some of the information being released, if the sheriff's office receives another request for this information from an individual other than this requestor, the sheriff's office must again seek a decision from this office.

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