Police Misconduct Records in Connecticut
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(Last updated April 4, 2024)
Police misconduct records are rarely covered by exemptions in the Connection Freedom of Information Act. These records typically do not involve documents compiled during the detection or investigation of crime, which is the threshold requirement for relevant exemptions in the law.
That said, legislators several years ago responded to the call for greater police accountability after the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers in May 2020. Connecticut passed the Police Accountability Act and expanded the list of infractions for which police officers could lose their license following an internal investigation. (1)
The new law provides that if there is a conflict between statutes concerning Connecticut FOI and state police union contracts, Connecticut FOI laws supersede the union agreement. (2) This part of the statute survived a legal challenge in 2022. In Connecticut State Police Union v. Rovella, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held that the statute did not violate the Contracts Clause of the Constitution. (3) The court held that the even though the state was party to the contract, it enacted the law to serve the legitimate public purpose of promoting transparency rather than to serve its own interests. (4)
Despite this victory, two major barriers to transparency that persist in Connecticut are the one-two punch of the “personnel records” exemption and the privacy exemption to the state’s freedom of information law. Under the personnel records exemption, a state employee can object to a record’s release if, after their state agency employer informs them, the person reasonably believes that disclosure of the records would constitute an invasion of privacy. (5)
The invasion of personal privacy exemption only applies when (1) the information sought does not pertain to legitimate matters of public concern, and (2) disclosure would be highly offensive to a reasonable person. (6) This high burden on agencies reflects the imperative that public employees remain accountable to the public. (7) As public employees, police officers have a diminished expectation of personal privacy. (8)
Connecticut courts have offered several interpretations on the application of the exemption to police misconduct reports. The Connecticut Supreme Court first addressed the invasion of personal privacy exemption relative to police records in Hartford v. Freedom of Information Commission. (9) In that case, a citizen filed a complaint with the Hartford Police Department alleging police brutality and a deprivation of civil rights. (10) After a department investigation occurred, the citizen sought the internal affairs report and any other reports of investigations by commanding officers or the department’s investigative review board. (11) The court held that the department had “utterly failed” to show that disclosure would constitute an invasion of privacy. (12) Although the court found the department improperly withheld the reports, its narrow holding left the door open for law enforcement to argue that disclosure could constitute an invasion of privacy in future cases if they could muster sufficient evidence.
Following Hartford, the Connecticut Supreme Court delineated when disclosure of police misconduct records might constitute an invasion of privacy in Department of Public Safety v. Freedom of Information Commission. (13) Here, requesters sought internal affairs reports that exonerated two state troopers. The first request related to an investigation into claims that a trooper assaulted and used excessive force on a citizen. (14) The second request sought a report examining a private citizen’s claim that a trooper engaged in an inappropriate relationship with that citizen’s wife. (15)
The court concluded that disclosure of the investigation report exonerating the trooper in the first case would not constitute an invasion of personal privacy, but that disclosure of the report exonerating the trooper in the second case from a charge of personal misconduct would, due to the private facts involved with the alleged affair. (16) As a result, future inquiries will likely hinge on whether internal affairs reports concern private or official misconduct.
More recently, the Connecticut Appeals Court affirmed a Freedom of Information Commission’s order to disclose certain documentation from an internal affairs investigation, despite the invasion of personal privacy exception being claimed. (17) In 2007, the Enfield Police Department initiated an internal investigation after a computer technician discovered improper instant messages on an officer’s personal USB drive. (18) The officer was terminated as a result of the investigation and a newspaper requested under FOIA the instant messages and other documentation. (19)
The Appeals Court found that, although the investigation concerned aspects of the officer’s private life, the alleged criminal conduct implicated his job as a public official. (20) The court also accepted the Commission’s conclusion that disclosure of the instant message conversations was necessary to facilitate the public’s understanding and evaluation of the police department’s investigative process, decision-making, and overall handling of an important matter involving a police officer. (21) The records therefore raised issues of legitimate public concern and could not be withheld under the invasion of personal privacy exception. (22)
(1) Conn. HB 6004, An Act Concerning Police Accountability (July 29, 2020).
(2) Id.
(3) Connecticut State Police Union v. Rovella, 36 F.4th 54 (2d Cir. 2022).
(4) Id. at 58.
(5) Id.; Conn. Gen. Stat. § 1-214.
(6) Perkins v. Freedom of Info. Comm’n, 228 Conn. at 175 (Conn. 1993).
(7) Id. at 177.
(8) See id.
(9) Hartford v. Freedom of Info. Comm’n, 201 Conn. 421 (Conn. 1986).
(10) Id. at 423.
(11) Id.
(12) Id. at 433-34.
(13) Dept. of Public Safety v. Freedom of Info. Comm’n, 242 Conn. 79, 81 (Conn. 1997).
(14) Id.
(15) Id.
(16) Id. at 85.
(17) See Tompkins v. Freedom of Info. Comm’n, 136 Conn. App. 496, 510 (Conn. App. Ct. 2012).
(18) Id. at 500.
(19) Id. at 498.
(20) Id. at 508.
(21) Id. at 509.
(22) See id. at 509-10.
(23) Conn. Gen. Stat. § 1-216.
(24) Id.