{"id":9228,"date":"2023-04-14T23:54:43","date_gmt":"2023-04-15T04:54:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mosunshine.org\/?p=9228"},"modified":"2023-04-17T15:50:29","modified_gmt":"2023-04-17T20:50:29","slug":"st-louis-arbitrary-handling-of-records-requests-on-display-in-court","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.riverfronttimes.com\/news\/st-louis-arbitrary-handling-of-records-requests-on-display-in-court-39861474","title":{"rendered":"St. Louis’ ‘Arbitrary’ Handling of Records Requests on Display in Court"},"content":{"rendered":"
Attorney Elad Gross.\u00a0\u00a0
\n COURTESY OF ELAD GROSS<\/em>” class=”uk-display-block uk-position-relative uk-visible-toggle”> \"Attorney <\/a> <\/p>\n
\n

COURTESY OF ELAD GROSS <\/p>\n

Attorney Elad Gross. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\nA city employee who has been the object of many gripes by local journalists and transparency advocates took the stand in court today as part of an ongoing lawsuit alleging St. Louis city government routinely flouts state transparency laws.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\nJoseph Sims\u2019 testimony at this morning’s hearing was part of a suit filed in September by Elad Gross, a Democrat running for Missouri attorney general, concerning records requests he made on behalf of Robert Childs.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\nChilds said he was assaulted while being detained in the St. Louis City Justice Center and that the attack was abetted by the conditions there, including doors that didn’t lock. Gross then requested records under Missouri\u2019s Sunshine law for a potential lawsuit on Childs\u2019 behalf. Gross says he waited a year for the requests to be filled before filing suit against the city \u2014 a lawsuit that drew significant publicity both for its allegations of an extensive pattern of violations<\/a> and the city\u2019s heavy-handed response<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n

\nGross\u2019 suit named Sims as one of the defendants.\n<\/p>\n

\nSims has become well-known among people who request records from the city. Post-Dispatch<\/i> <\/em>columnist Tony Messenger wrote in a column last year<\/a> that messages from Sims to records requestors explaining why requests couldn’t be fulfilled or why fulfillment would be delayed were “becoming infamous among the circles of folks \u2014 especially reporters and attorneys \u2014 who regularly file requests for open records with the city.”\n<\/p>\n

\nGross says that Childs’ situation is emblematic of why delays in fulfilling records requests matter. The laws under which Childs might file a civil suit have statutes of limitations, making the city’s slow-walking of disclosure of relevant facts all the more problematic.\n<\/p>\n

\nOn the stand today, Sims described himself as a paralegal with the City Counselor’s Office. He wore glasses and a goatee, his jet black hair swooped to one side.\n<\/p>\n

\nSims testified that as the city’s Sunshine coordinator he is not the custodian of records for any city division but acts as a liaison between the requestor and the various record custodians throughout city government.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\nOn the stand, Sims acknowledged that many responses to Sunshine requests are pre-written email templates, and in any given response little is changed other than the applicable city departments and dates.\n<\/p>\n

\nIn his questions, Gross drilled down on the templates that tell a requestor more time is needed to fulfill their request. These responses say, “per the Custodian of Records\u2026additional time will be necessary to respond to your request.” They go on to list the \u201cearliest possible date\u201d by which records may be made available.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\nSims said this morning that “at times” he sends out those replies as well as assigns new \u201cearliest possible dates\u201d \u2014 despite having heard nothing from the relevant department\u2019s custodian of records.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\nIn one specific instance involving a records request Gross made to the city\u2019s Department of Public Safety, Sims said of that department’s records custodian, “She didn’t communicate [a date]. I gave her one.”\n<\/p>\n

\nAfter the hearing, Gross called this practice “definitely arbitrary.”\n<\/p>\n

\n“Although he said he’s doing it based on some reason, he didn’t really give what the reason was he’s selecting certain days. When he’s responding to someone without actually responding on behalf of the custodian, but he’s saying he’s doing on behalf of the custodian, because he’s trying to cover himself in all this \u2014 that’s a very big problem,\u201d Gross said. \u201cHe should not be doing that.”\n<\/p>\n

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Follow us: Google News<\/a> | NewsBreak<\/a> | Reddit<\/a> | Instagram<\/a> | Facebook <\/a> | Twitter<\/a><\/b><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Attorney Elad Gross.\u00a0\u00a0 COURTESY OF ELAD GROSS” class=”uk-display-block uk-position-relative uk-visible-toggle”> COURTESY OF ELAD GROSS Attorney Elad Gross. A city employee who has been the object of many gripes by local journalists and transparency advocates took the stand in court today as part of an ongoing lawsuit alleging St. Louis city government routinely flouts state transparency …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"twitter_1316405950194966529_1316405950194966529":"","facebook_10227908901730409_331941356894613":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-recent-sunshine-law-news"],"yoast_head":"\nSt. Louis' 'Arbitrary' Handling of Records Requests on Display in Court - Missouri Sunshine Coalition<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"St. Louis' 'Arbitrary' Handling of Records Requests on Display in Court\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Attorney Elad Gross.\u00a0\u00a0 COURTESY OF ELAD GROSS” class=”uk-display-block uk-position-relative uk-visible-toggle”> COURTESY OF ELAD GROSS Attorney Elad Gross. 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