Clerk v. Freedom of Information Com'n

• Decision Date: 02 May 2006
• Docket Number: No. 17273.,17273.
• Citation: 278 Conn. 28,895 A.2d 743
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: CLERK OF THE SUPERIOR COURT, Geographical Area Number Seven et al. v. FREEDOM OF INFORMATION COMMISSION.

Page 743

895 A.2d 743

278 Conn. 28

CLERK OF THE SUPERIOR COURT, Geographical Area Number Seven et al. v. FREEDOM OF INFORMATION COMMISSION.

No. 17273.

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Argued February 10, 2005.

Decided May 2, 2006.

Victor R. Perpetua, appellate attorney, with whom, on the brief was Mitchell W. Pearlman, general counsel, for the appellant (defendant).

Martin R. Libbin, deputy director of legal services, for the appellees (plaintiffs).

SULLIVAN, C.J., and BORDEN, NORCOTT, KATZ, PALMER, ZARELLA and LAVERY, Js.^*

SULLIVAN, C.J.

The principal issue in this appeal is whether certain records created and retained by the plaintiffs, the clerk of the Superior Court, geographical area number seven (clerk), and the state judicial branch (judicial branch), are related to the judicial branch's administrative functions and, therefore, are subject to disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act (act), General Statutes § 1-200 et seq. The defendant, the freedom of information commission (commission), appeals from the judgment of the trial court sustaining the plaintiffs' appeal from the commission's decision that the records were subject to the provisions of the act. The commission claims on appeal that, inter alia, the trial court improperly concluded that, because the records did not relate exclusively to an administrative function, they were exempt from disclosure under General Statutes §§ 1-200(1)(A),¹ 1-210(a)² and 1-200(5).³ We affirm the judgment of the trial court.

The record reveals the following undisputed facts and procedural history. On January 28, 2001, Russell Collins, an attorney with the law firm of Russell Collins, LLC, submitted a letter to the clerk requesting permission on behalf of his firm to inspect the court's "`[p]ending book'"<sup>4</sup> and "`daybooks'"⁵ for the period from January 2, 2002, to January 29, 2002, any ledgers identifying cases currently pending before the court and any other records that would allow identification of pending cases in "`pre-arraignment'" status.⁶ On January 30, Martin R. Libbin, an attorney employed by and representing the judicial branch, denied the request on the ground that the requested records did not involve an administrative function of the judicial branch within the meaning of § 1-200(1)(A) and, therefore, were not subject to the act. Libbin advised Collins, however, that General Statutes § 51-5b(b)⁷ "allows persons seeking access to information contained in the [judicial branch's] combined criminal and motor vehicle informational system to request custom reports" and provided Collins with contact information for obtaining such reports.

On February 5, 2002, Collins submitted another letter to the clerk in which he requested daybooks for the period from January 30, 2002, to February 6, 2002, and "any nonexempt information maintained within any computer storage system that reflects in regard to each Defendant in any criminal case or action where: it is alleged that such Defendant committed a criminal offense . . . and such case or action was first filed against such Defendant during the time period from January 15, 2002 to February 6, 2002; and such case or action is currently pending in the [court]; any of the following;

"a. the Defendant's name;

"b. the Defendant's address;

"c. the Defendant's date of birth;

"d. the Docket numbers of the criminal charges filed against the Defendant;

"e. the date of the next Court hearing in the Defendant's case;

"f. the nature, or type, of the next Court hearing in the Defendant's case;

"g. whether such Defendant is represented by counsel;

"h. whether the Defendant has a jail code, etc., or is otherwise currently incarcerated."

Libbin again denied the request on the ground that the requested information was not administrative in nature. Collins then filed a complaint with the commission claiming that the plaintiffs had violated the act by denying his requests. After a hearing on the complaint, the commission found that the pending book⁸ and the daybook⁹ contained some information that was exempt from the act, namely, information concerning juveniles, sealed records and erased records. Redacting the exempt information would involve "a time consuming and burdensome process of checking each file in the [judicial branch's criminal/motor vehicle computer system]" (computer system). The computer system was "centrally operated by the [judicial branch], but . . . available locally to the [clerk]," and was continually updated to indicate whether the cases involved juveniles or had been sealed or erased.

Although the commission concluded that the pending book and daybook were not disclosable, it concluded that the information in the computer system itself was subject to the act. Relying on this court's decision in Connecticut Bar Examining Committee v. Freedom of Information Commission, 209 Conn. 204, 550 A.2d 633 (1988), the commission concluded that the computer system records "serve both `administrative functions' and `adjudicative functions,'" and that "any records relating to the performance of [administrative functions] must be [made] available pursuant to [§ 1-210], unless doing so would in some manner interfere with the performance of judicial functions. [Id., at 208, 550 A.2d 633] . . . ." (Internal quotation marks omitted.) The commission further concluded that, although "new administrative procedures may be required to guarantee the timely entry of new data concerning exempt records into the [computer system] . . . pending case information . . . can be provided from computerized court records . . . without interfering with the performance of judicial functions."¹⁰ Accordingly it concluded that the computer system records were administrative records subject to the act and ordered the judicial branch periodically to allow Collins to inspect the records. The commission stayed the order for ninety days in order to allow the judicial branch "to implement such procedures as it considers appropriate concerning the periods for public inspection and the timely entry of new data by its staff into [the computer system]."

The plaintiffs appealed from the commission's decision to the trial court, which sustained the appeal. The court noted that the commission had found that compliance with Collins' request to review the pending book and the daybook would be "`time consuming and burdensome'" but that access to the computer system could be provided "`without interfering with the performance of judicial functions.' . . . Based on this finding of the hearing officer, the [commission] ordered the judicial branch to `periodically allow [Collins] to inspect the requested records of the [computer system].' . . . This order is foreign to the language of § 1-210(1)(A) which restricts disclosure only to administrative matters because the order does not allow the judicial branch to screen what records deal with a judicial function and which deal with administrative functions." Accordingly, the court concluded that the commission had "extended its reach beyond that contemplated by the legislature as expressed in § 1-210(1)(A)" and sustained the plaintiffs' appeal. The commission appealed from the trial court's judgment to the Appellate Court and we transferred the appeal to this court pursuant to General Statutes § 51-199(c) and Practice Book § 65-1.

The commission claims on appeal that the trial court improperly concluded that (1) the information in the computer system is not solely administrative but involves the adjudication of cases and, therefore, is exempt from the act, (2) the difficulty of providing access to the pending book and daybooks affected the administrative nature of the information contained in the computer system, and (3) permitting periodic access to the computer system records would require the judicial branch to screen each record to determine whether it involved a judicial function or an administrative function. We conclude that the judicial branch's administrative functions, as that phrase is used in § 1-200(1)(A), consist of activities relating to its budget, personnel, facilities and physical operations. Because the information in the computer system did not relate to these activities, we conclude that the trial court properly determined that the computer records did not constitute public records within the meaning of §§ 1-200(5) and 1-210(a) and, therefore, were not subject to the act.

As a preliminary matter, we set forth our standard of review. "Ordinarily, we give great deference to the construction given a statute by the agency charged with its enforcement. . . . [T]he construction and interpretation of a statute is a question of law for the courts where the administrative decision is not entitled to special deference, particularly where . . . the statute has not previously been subjected to judicial scrutiny or time-tested agency interpretations." (Citations omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.) State Medical Society v. Board of Examiners in Podiatry, 208 Conn. 709, 718, 546 A.2d 830 (1988). Although this court previously has construed the provisions of the act as they apply to the judicial branch; see, e.g., Connecticut Bar Examining Committee v. Freedom of Information Commission, supra, 209 Conn. at 210-11, 550 A.2d 633; we have not addressed the application of the act to the specific types of judicial records at issue in the present case. Accordingly, our standard of review is de novo. State Medical Society v. Board of Examiners in Podiatry, supra, at 716-20, 546 A.2d 830.

We begin our analysis with the language of the relevant statutes. Section 1-210(a) provides that all public records are subject to the act. Section 1-200(5) provides in relevant part: "`Public records or files' means any recorded data or information relating to the conduct of the public's business prepared, owned, used, received or retained by a public agency . . . ." (Emphasis added.) Section 1-200(1)(A) defi...