Bexar County criminal cases since '74 now online

"After years of planning and delays, Bexar County on Thursday granted the public free online access to local felony case records — detailing 267,000 prosecutions that cover almost four decades.

“It's a huge amount of data,” said District Clerk Donna Kay McKinney.

“It's accurate,” McKinney added, but she cautioned those hoping to use the data for background checks that it does not include offenses from other counties.

Without having to go to the courthouse, now anyone can at least find out whether someone they know or plan to hire or do business with has a Bexar County criminal history."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Nev. texting while driving law brings fines Jan. 1

"Driving while texting or talking on a handheld device will hit Nevadans in their wallets come Jan. 1 as a new law shifts from warnings to fines, among nearly three dozen other laws that take effect in the new year.

The cellphone ban took effect Oct. 1, but until now authorities haven't issued tickets. Nevadans were given a three-month grace period to get used to the idea.

That changes Sunday, when the fine for a first offense will be $50. A second offense will cost $100, and a third or subsequent offense brings a $250 fine, not including court costs."
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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Secret subpoena aimed at Twitter user not so secret anymore http://ping.fm/9sNaX

Secret subpoena aimed at Twitter user not so secret anymore

"Massachusetts authorities apparently thought that asking nicely would suffice to keep secret their subpoena for information on a Twitter user involved with Occupy Wall Street. They thought wrong.

So when the Suffolk County District Attorney's office sent its request to Twitter, its subpoena ended up in the inbox of the DA's target, following a decision by Twitter to share it as part of its privacy policy."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Access to some ND court records may be blocked http://ping.fm/CTGjT

California's New Laws in 2012 http://ping.fm/4gEkr

Pa. does not have to disclose birth dates http://ping.fm/232p2

Pa. does not have to disclose birth dates

"A Pennsylvania appeals court says the Corbett administration does not have to disclose the precise dates of birth for state workers under the Right-to-Know Law.

The Commonwealth Court on Thursday said the threat of identity theft is sufficient to trigger the "personal security" exception in the open-records law."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

California's New Laws in 2012

"California’s state lawmakers were busy little bees this year and a slew of new laws created by the Legislature start taking effect Jan. 1, 2012. In 2011, lawmakers in all 50 states and territories came up with close to 40,000 new laws on issues across the board."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Access to some ND court records may be blocked

"North Dakota's Supreme Court has endorsed allowing judges to block electronic access to state records of criminal prosecutions if the person accused is acquitted or the charges are dismissed.

Jack McDonald, a Bismarck attorney who represents North Dakota newspapers and broadcasters, called it "self-defeating," given the high court's efforts to make judicial information available through the Internet.

North Dakota residents who are doing quick background checks now will be denied access to information they are paying for, McDonald said."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Tulsa County Oklahoma begins posting court documents online

"New rules by the Oklahoma Supreme Court governing the use of personal information in public records is getting one of its first tests in Tulsa County.


Tulsa County Court Clerk Sally Howe Smith has begun posting civil pleadings, criminals charges and other court documents on the Internet, she said. However, trial transcripts will not be placed online, Smith said.

Smith said her office began posting filings Dec. 15. With the exception of small claims judgments, documents filed before that date will not be placed online and will continue to be available at the clerk's office, she said."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Vermont panel recommends property taxes be public

"The Public Records Legislative Study Committee — meeting last week for the last time before the Legislature reconvenes in January — seems to have settled a few issues, sort of.

The committee, which is charged with examining state laws to see if all things that are exempt from public records really should be, decided to recommend that state property tax records be declared public, said Rep. Donna Sweaney, D-Windsor, co-chairwoman of the panel. However, the group also decided to recommend that the state return to directly making income-sensitivity payments to taxpayers (call them prebates, rebates, whatever) so that any income-related information won’t be on a person’s property tax records."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

New Jersey State Police overtime pay removed from public info search

"State Attorney General Paula Dow has created new rules that will keep records of any State Police overtime pay confidential, blocking their access to the public.

NJ.com reports that Dow’s rule applies to law enforcement officers under the Department of Law and Public Safety, but total overtime figures for the departments will still be available. The measure does not apply to local police departments."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Arkansas Police disciplinary files open, attorney general says

"Missed this yesterday. It's an official attorney general's opinion, in response to a question posed by Little Rock Officer Joshua Hastings, about a decision by the department to open investigative files concerning Hastings' 10-day suspension. The attorney general said he agreed that the material should be disclosed."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Nevada Supreme Court expands open records law

"The Nevada Supreme Court has expanded the state’s open records law to allow the public more access to government documents, including logs of e-mails.

The court, in a unanimous opinion written by Chief Justice Nancy Saitta, ruled in a case in which former Gov. Jim Gibbons refused to turn over his 104 e-mail records to the Reno Gazette-Journal in correspondence with ten persons during a six-month period."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

California website's glitches block online tracking of campaign donations

"With just six months until the June primary election, campaign cash is starting to flow to candidate and ballot measure committees.

But for much of the past two weeks, technological difficulties have blocked the public's ability to track the transactions online.

Cal-Access, the 12-year-old portal for filing campaign finance and lobbying reports, has been down for all but 30 hours since Nov. 30."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Federal court rules SEC can withhold investigation notes

"A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. ruled that a federal agency's release of documents in a criminal prosecution did not require another agency to release the same or related documents under the federal Freedom of Information Act.

Friday’s ruling affirmed the decision of a lower court that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission can still withhold 114 sets of handwritten notes from release under a federal Freedom of Information Act request even though the U.S. Department of Justice had previously released 11 of the 114 sets in a criminal trial."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

UCSF to Receive Tobacco Papers, Funding to Improve Public Access to the Documents

"The U.S. Department of Justice filed a proposed consent order today with a federal district court that finalizes requirements for three major tobacco companies to make internal documents public in accordance with an earlier ruling that the companies violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. The documents will be archived in UCSF’s Legacy Tobacco Documents Library (LTDL)."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Maine court hears public access case

"Six Maine counties are hoping the state's highest court will overturn a lower court decision that sided with a company seeking registry of deeds documents at a lower cost than the counties want to charge.

MacImage of Maine LLC, joined by the American Civil Liberties Union of Maine and the Maine Freedom of Information Coalition, argued Tuesday that the registries of deeds' records are public under Maine law and that the public is allowed to inspect and copy those records at a reasonable cost.

The company intends to create a website containing the registries of deeds records and charge for access, undercutting the price charged by the counties' offices."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Okla. Supreme Court issues rule allowing greater public access to online court records

"The Oklahoma Supreme Court scrapped a plan Monday that would have allowed birth dates and home addresses to be excluded from public court documents.

The new rule applies to district courts across the state and was developed as part of the high court's plan to develop a statewide court system database that will allow the public to have online access to virtually every document filed in all 77 of the state's courthouses.

It provides that those who file court documents may only limit information on Social Security, taxpayer ID, financial account and driver's license numbers.

The previous proposed rule released by the court directed court filers to omit names of minor children, dates of births and home addresses, prompting opposition from a diverse group that included prosecutors, law enforcement, attorneys and the media."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Posting of LAPD commanders' personal data prompts city action

"Anonymous postings of personal information on more than two dozen L.A. police commanders prompted a councilman to propose supporting legislation that would keep such records confidential, officials said Monday.

Last week, the Los Angeles Police Department opened an investigation into who listed officers' property records, campaign contributions, biographical information and, in a few cases, the names of children and other family members on sites that allow users to anonymously input data.

Such sites have increasingly been used to post the personal information of individuals who raise the ire of online activists, a practice known as "doxing."
On Friday, Councilman Dennis P. Zine, a former LAPD officer, introduced a motion calling on the state to mandate that county assessors keep law enforcement officials' records confidential, similar to protections offered by the state Department of Motor Vehicles."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Facial Recognition Apps Carries Risk of User Privacy Violations, FTC Warns

"Companies need to be careful about not violating user privacy when implementing facial recognition technology in their products, the Federal Trade Commission warned.

The Federal Trade Commission would take a hard line on companies that violate consumer privacy using facial recognition technology, the agency's chairman said at a public workshop.

Government officials, privacy advocates and technology companies discussed the ethics of facial recognition and the impact on user privacy at a workshop in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 8."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Library of Congress to receive entire Twitter archive

"The Library of Congress and Twitter have signed an agreement that will see an archive of every public Tweet ever sent handed over to the library's repository of historical documents.

...Researchers will be able to look at the Twitter archive as a complete set of data, which they could then data-mine for interesting information."


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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Arkansas Supreme Court reverses conviction in Twittering juror case

"The Arkansas Supreme Court today reversed the capital murder conviction and death sentence of Erickson Dimas-Martinez in Benton County because Judge David Clinger failed to call a mistrial or dismiss jurors who'd either slept during the trial or who'd disregarded the judge's instructions and used his cell phone to Twitter during the trial and jury deliberations."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

California Court Denies Access to Domestic Violence Registry

"A local resident has lost his bid to access the state’s Domestic Violence Restraining Order System in order to determine whether he is the subject of any order registered there.

Div. Three of this district’s Court of Appeal Thursday affirmed a ruling by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Ronald M. Sohigian that the registry’s contents are exempt from disclosure under the Information Practices Act of 1977."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Connecticut: Victim privacy vs. open records case

"Connecticut's Supreme Court is considering whether the state constitution's promise of respectful, fair treatment for crime victims entitles them to a voice in decisions on whether certain court records of their abusers can be released."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator Research Links - Nov 2011

• The British Newspaper Archive

• Obtaining EDs and streets for the 1910-1940 Census in One Step

• California Death Index 1940-1997

• California Birth Index - Free

• SimilarPages.com - Find similar websites

• SimilarSiteSearch.com - Find Similar Websites

• Company Director Check - free UK company director search

• Craigslist Alerts at List-Alert.com

• Open Status Search - Search Facebook without logging in

• Kurrently - A real-time search engine for Facebook and Twitter.

• Wolfram|Alpha: Computational Knowledge Engine

• DuckDuckGo Search Engine

• Users Guide and Form Letter for The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)

The rest of my favorite links are here.