City of Eureka v. Superior Court of Humboldt Cnty.

• Decision Date: 19 July 2016
• Docket Number: A145701
• Citation: 1 Cal.App.5th 755,205 Cal.Rptr.3d 134
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: CITY OF EUREKA, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. The SUPERIOR COURT OF HUMBOLDT COUNTY, Defendant and Respondent; Thadeus Greenson, Real Party in Interest and Respondent.

1 Cal.App.5th 755

205 Cal.Rptr.3d 134

CITY OF EUREKA, Plaintiff and Appellant

v.The SUPERIOR COURT OF HUMBOLDT COUNTY, Defendant and Respondent;

Thadeus Greenson, Real Party in Interest and Respondent.

A145701

Court of Appeal, First District, Division 5, California.

Filed July 19, 2016

Cyndy Day–Wilson, City Attorney, for Plaintiff and Appellant.

Mary Blair Angus, County Counsel, for Defendant and Respondent.

Paul Nicholas Boylan, for Real Party in Interest and Respondent.

Jones

, P.J.

The issue in this case is whether a video of an arrest captured by a patrol car's dashboard camera is a confidential “personnel record” under Penal Code sections 832.7

or 832.8.¹ On the record before us, the answer is no. We conclude the juvenile court properly determined the arrest video is not a personnel record protected by the Pitchess statutes. (See Pitchess v. Superior Court (1974) 11 Cal.3d 531, 113 Cal.Rptr. 897, 522 P.2d 305 (Pitchess ).) We therefore affirm the court's order requiring the City of Eureka (City) to release a portion of the video to local reporter and real party in interest, Thadeus Greenson.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Arrest, Charges, and Internal Affairs Investigation

In December 2012, Eureka Police Sergeant Adam Laird and other Eureka police officers arrested H.M. (the minor). Sergeant Laird chased the minor, who “was pushed to the ground, fell to the ground, or just gave up and laid on the ground.” Another police officer arrived “in his patrol vehicle with its in-car video equipment activated[.]” The patrol car's mobile audio video (MAV) recording system produced several videos of the arrest.² The prosecution filed a Welfare and Institutions Code section 602

petition against the minor, but later withdrew it.

A citizen lodged a complaint regarding the officers' “handling of the minor” and the Eureka Police Department conducted an internal affairs investigation. The prosecution charged Sergeant Laird with misdemeanor assault by a police officer without lawful necessity (§ 149) and with making a false report (§ 118.1). Both the prosecution and defense hired experts to review the evidence against Sergeant Laird. After reviewing the evidence—including the arrest video—the experts determined Sergeant Laird did not use excessive force during the arrest. The prosecution dismissed the charges against Sergeant Laird in January 2014.

Greenson's Request for Disclosure of the Arrest Video

In July 2013 and January 2014, Greenson wrote articles in two local newspapers about the arrest and subsequent litigation. In August 2014, Greenson filed a California Public Records Act (Gov. Code, § 6250, et seq.

) request with the City seeking disclosure of the arrest video. The City denied the request, “citing discretionary exemptions for personnel records and investigative files.”

In November 2014, Greenson filed a request for disclosure (form JV–570) of the arrest video pursuant to Welfare and Institutions Code section 827

, which authorizes public disclosure of confidential juvenile records under limited circumstances. Greenson averred the video “formed the basis” for the charges against Sergeant Laird, but the prosecution “later dismissed the charges with little, if any, explanation. [Sergeant] Laird's defense ... was an allegation that he'd been singled out for arrest by the ... Police Department for exercising his First Amendment free speech rights and that the [police department] deliberately withheld exculpatory evidence from prosecutors.” According to Greenson, “the public has a right to know exactly what happened” during the minor's arrest “to evaluate the performance of both its police officers and prosecutors. The public's only avenue to that knowledge, and the only thing that will allow the public to make that evaluation, is the video [of the] arrest.”

The Humboldt County Probation Department (the County) objected, claiming Greenson failed to demonstrate good cause for disclosure under Welfare and Institutions Code section 827

. As the County explained, “[p]ublic dissemination of the video is not necessary to facilitate public scrutiny” of Sergeant Laird's conduct because Greenson had “already obtained court records and other public documents describing the events depicted by the video and ha[d] previously published details of the incident.... Under these circumstances, release of the video would serve only to prejudice the minor by exposing his image, his actions, and his juvenile record to widespread public scrutiny.” The County also noted Greenson had not served the police department with the disclosure request. The City also urged the court to deny Greenson's request. It argued the video was a police officer “personnel record” and “[d]isclosure ... would require a successful Pitchess

[m]otion,” which Greenson had not filed. The City also claimed disclosing the video could be detrimental to the minor under Welfare and Institutions Code section 827.

At a late January 2015 hearing, the court directed Greenson to serve the police department and the City with the disclosure request and continued the matter to late February 2015. Before the February 2015 hearing, Greenson filed a reply offering additional information about the criminal case against Sergeant Laird and claiming the case “called into question” the conduct of the “entire [police] department.” According to Greenson, the public had “a right to evaluate the conduct of its officers and prosecutors” and needed to know why criminal charges were filed against Sergeant Laird when “experts determined [his] use of force was justified[.]” Greenson also argued releasing the arrest video would not harm the minor, because he did not oppose disclosure and because the arrest had been “widely reported on[.]” Finally, Greenson claimed the video was not a personnel record protected by the Pitchess

statutes.

At a February 2015 hearing, the minor “waive[d] his right to confidentiality” of the arrest video and consented to disclosure. The County and the City, however, continued to oppose the video's release. As relevant here, the City argued the police department had conducted an internal affairs investigation and the video was “part of that [investigation]” and could not be released “without a successful Pitchess

motion.” According to the City, a Pitchess motion could not be filed because “[t]here are no cases pending, no charges have been filed. Nothing is pending at this point.” The court indicated its inclination to review the video in camera and to determine whether there was a “compelling need ... for ... the public to have that ... information.”

Pursuant to the court's order, the County provided the court with “an unedited version” of the arrest captured by the MAV “units from the various patrol units involved.” The court reviewed the videos in camera. In a May 2015 written order, the court ordered disclosure of the arrest video. It concluded the video was not a confidential police personnel record protected by the Pitchess

statutes, explaining the arrest was “both the subject of a delinquency investigation and potentially actions which could result in confidential internal personnel proceedings. [Greenson] is not requesting what might otherwise be the subject of a Pitchess

type motion such as confidential citizen complaints and the resulting investigation or outcomes of those investigations. He is requesting only that information which would form the basis of the original criminal complaint against [Sergeant Laird] or delinquency proceedings against the minor.”

As required by Welfare and Institutions Code section 827

, the court considered the public interest in disclosure, including “the interest of transparency of juvenile court proceedings[,]” and the “minor's consent to disclosure[.]” The court ordered the City to release the video pursuant to a protective order removing the minor's name and redacting or blurring his identifying features to conceal his identity. Finally, the court concluded the remainder of the MAV videos were redundant or irrelevant and declined to disclose them; it set a June 2015 hearing to review the redacted video.

The day before the June 2015 hearing, the City filed writ petition seeking to vacate the court's May 2015 ruling. (City of Eureka v. Superior Court , A145288). This court denied the City's writ petition. The City appealed from the court's May 2015 order.

DISCUSSION

I.

Welfare and Institutions Code Section 827 and the Pitchess Statutes

The City contends the court erred by ordering disclosure of the arrest video, which is part of the minor's case file. (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 827, subd. (e)

; see also Hoffstadt, California Criminal Discovery (5th ed. 2015) § 12.13(a)(vii), pp. 332–333 [describing contents of “juvenile ‘case file’ ”].) In general, juvenile court records are confidential. (In re Keisha T. (1995) 38 Cal.App.4th 220, 230, 44 Cal.Rptr.2d 822 (Keisha T. ).) But “this policy of confidentiality is not absolute.” (Id. at p. 231, 44 Cal.Rptr.2d 822.) Welfare and Institutions Code section 827 “governs the release of such records” (Pack v. Kings County Human Services Agency (2001) 89 Cal.App.4th 821, 827, 107 Cal.Rptr.2d 594 (Pack )) and “enumerates a list of persons who may inspect a juvenile case file without a court order; in addition, a juvenile case file may be inspected by ‘[a]ny other person who may be designated by court order of the judge of the juvenile court upon filing a petition.’ ” (People v. Thurston (2016) 244 Cal.App.4th 644, 670–671, 198 Cal.Rptr.3d 585, fn. omitted, quoting Welf. & Inst. Code, § 827, subd. (a)(1)(P)

.) Under appropriate circumstances, a juvenile court may order the release of juvenile court records to the press. (Keisha T., supra , 38 Cal.App.4th at p. 236, 44 Cal.Rptr.2d 822 [newspaper publisher]; Pack, supra , 89 Cal.App.4th at p. 828, 107 Cal.Rptr.2d 594 [newspapers and press representatives].)

“When such a petition is presented, the juvenile court's duty is to ‘balance the interests of the child and...