incident reports Archives - Tennessee Coalition for Open Government

Why refusing to release a police incident report is a problem

The Knoxville News Sentinel reported today that Oak Ridge officials have refused to release a police incident report in a case in which two officers fired four gunshots at a suicidal woman. This is the second time in recent weeks that journalist Bob Fowler has reported that the police department has refused to give media a copy of an incident report in a situation involving or possibly involving police. The other was in a case in which a woman said she was sexually assaulted by someone who appeared to be a police officer or security guard. In both instances, the Oak Ridge police released some information through a press release. [...]

Does the public have a right to see police incident reports?

By Deborah Fisher|2017-01-06T15:27:02-06:00April 14, 2014|Categories: Attorney General Opinions, crime records, Office of Open Records Counsel|Tags: AG opinion, crime records, Elisha Hodge, incident reports, OORC|2 Comments

A city editor called me recently, wanting to know what records his local police department was required to make public. Seems like a simple question, but in Tennessee, it has become anything but that. The city editor’s staff was dealing with a new public information officer at the police department who was declining to turn over some incident reports because of their sensitive nature. The newspaper had a good relationship with the police chief and knew his track record was to be as transparent as possible about crime in the community. The city editor hopes the matter is now resolved, with the police chief’s guidance that incident reports should not [...]