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Highlighting reporting that makes use of the Freedom of Information Act and other public records laws.

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LA Times: No charges for 'Capt. Hollywood'; detectives claim LAPD mishandled CBS exec case leak https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-12-12/cory-palka-lapd-captain-hollywood-case
Excerpt: The L.A. County district attorney’s office decided in April it would not prosecute Cory Palka for warning CBS executives in 2017 that a woman had walked into the LAPD’s Hollywood station and accused then-Chief Executive Les Moonves of sexual assault, according to a document provided to The Times in response to a public records request.
December 12, 2025 at 1:43 PM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
The Marshall Project: Missouri Journalists: How to Access the State Prison System’s Comprehensive Death Data https://www.themarshallproject.org/2025/12/12/missouri-state-prison-death-data-access
Excerpt: As a reminder, you are required by the state's Sunshine open records law to respond to this request within three business days.
December 12, 2025 at 1:13 PM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
The Intercept: ICE Prison’s 911 Calls Overwhelm a Rural Georgia Emergency System https://theintercept.com/2025/12/12/stewart-911-calls-ice-ambulance-emergency/
Excerpt: Data obtained by The Intercept through open records requests shows that the top four reasons for 911 calls since the onset of the second Trump administration have been chest pains and seizures, with the same number of calls, followed by stomach pains and head injuries.
December 12, 2025 at 11:25 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
HuffPost: Judge Allows Ghislaine Maxwell's Sex Trafficking Case Records To Be Unsealed https://www.huffpost.com/entry/judge-allows-ghislaine-maxwells-sex-trafficking-case-records-to-be-unsealed_n_693833fbe4b013f1f7d315f6
Excerpt: Tens of thousands of pages of records pertaining to Epstein and Maxwell have already been released through lawsuits, public disclosures and Freedom of Information Act requests.
December 10, 2025 at 5:34 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
Chicago Tribune: Justice Department can unseal Ghislaine Maxwell sex trafficking case records, judge says https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/09/ghislaine-maxwell-sex-trafficking-case-records/
Excerpt: Tens of thousands of pages of records pertaining to Epstein and Maxwell have already been released through lawsuits, public disclosures and Freedom of Information Act requests.
December 9, 2025 at 5:37 PM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
Chicago Tribune: Experts: From shooting to Slim Jims, immigration agents’ poor tactics made for needless safety risks https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/07/experts-immigration-agents-poor-tactics-unsafe-policing/
Excerpt: Body camera footage obtained in a Freedom of Information act request depicts a Palatine police officer participating in a federal immigration arrest on Oct. 27, 2025. Village officials said the officer acted in order to ensure the safety of the man being arrested, the federal agents and the crowd, but others have questioned whether the officer's actions violated state law. (Palatine police)
December 7, 2025 at 11:05 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
ProPublica: Sick in a Hospital Town https://www.propublica.org/article/sick-in-a-hospital-town
Excerpt: The consultants reminded the authority that because it was subject to open records laws, the report was going to get out. However if the authority released it, members would have better control of how it was perceived: It would demonstrate the body’s independence and its fidelity to its oversight responsibilities.
December 7, 2025 at 10:43 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
LA Times: To protect underage farmworkers, California expands oversight of field conditions https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-12-05/underage-farmworkers-california-expands-oversight-of-field-conditions
Excerpt: But records obtained under the California Public Records Act for that period show that only a small number of child labor enforcement actions involved the agricultural industry. Just 27 citations were issued for child labor violations to the thousands of agricultural employers across California, the records show. The fines totaled $36,000, but the state collected only $2,814.
December 5, 2025 at 12:12 PM
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Chicago Tribune: Advocate warned city that feds might target rideshare drivers at O’Hare weeks before airport raids, emails show https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/04/ohare-airport-raids-rideshare-drivers/
Excerpt: Stastny replied about 25 minutes later: “Thank you for the information.” Email records, which the Tribune obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request, show he then passed Simmons’ message along to other Aviation Department staffers.
December 4, 2025 at 11:04 AM
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The Marshall Project: In New York Prisons, Lack of Medical Care Led to Preventable Deaths https://www.themarshallproject.org/2025/12/03/new-york-prison-healthcare-deaths
Excerpt: Keach detailed how difficult it is for families to learn what happened. They are not notified of the investigation or report. Some redacted reports are on the commission website. If not, the family must file a public records request. To obtain a full, unredacted report, next of kin must file a lawsuit.
December 3, 2025 at 11:03 AM
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ProPublica: Powerful Friends: Sympathetic Officials and “Cultural Power” Help Ranchers Dodge Oversight https://www.propublica.org/article/politicians-help-ranchers-dodge-oversight
Excerpt: After repeated calls, texts and letters, the Forest Service sent the ranchers a “notice of noncompliance,” according to documents obtained via public records requests. The agency asserted that the ranchers had engaged in “a willful and intentional violation” of their permit and warned that future violations could lead to its revocation. Excerpt: Since 2020, members of Congress on both sides of the aisle have written to the BLM and Forest Service about grazing issues more than 20 times, according to logs of agency communications obtained by ProPublica and High Country News via public records requests. In addition to Daines and Gianforte, these members include Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz.; former Rep. Yvette Herrell, R-N.M.; former Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.; Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and others. Their communications addressed such issues as “Request for Flexibility with Grazing Permits” and “Public Lands Rule Impact on Ranchers and Rural Communities.” Excerpt: Still, in May, Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz gave staff about two weeks to compile lists of unused grazing allotments that could be quickly refilled with livestock, according to internal communications obtained by ProPublica and High Country News via public records requests. Such policies cater to grazing permittee advocates like the Public Lands Council, which in a 2024 policy paper called on federal agencies to swiftly fill vacant allotments. The council did not respond to requests for comment.
December 3, 2025 at 10:03 AM
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Chicago Tribune: Hanover Park police officer busted by ICE back to full duty, village says https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/02/hanover-park-police-immigration-blitz-trump/
Excerpt: According to village records obtained by the Tribune through a Freedom of Information Act Request, Hanover Park apparently had two work authorization cards on file for Bojovic. It is unclear when the cards were issued or what their expiration dates are due to village redactions on records.
December 3, 2025 at 12:13 AM
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LA Times: Robert Silverstein, who fought City Hall over Hollywood development and won, dies at 57 https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-12-02/robert-silverstein-who-fought-city-hall-over-hollywood-development-won-dies-at-57
Excerpt: The son of a rabbi, Silverstein handled cases across Southern California, zeroing in on what he viewed as violations of zoning plans, public records laws, historic preservation rules, eminent domain procedures and the state’s environmental law, known by its acronym CEQA, or see-quah. Silverstein represented clients in Baldwin Park, Culver City, Glendora, Palmdale, Pasadena, Santa Ana and other communities.
December 2, 2025 at 7:44 PM
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Chicago Tribune: Elon Musk is building out his next company town with science center, gym https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/02/elon-musk-science-center-company/
Excerpt: Snailbrook is now set to get even more of the trappings of a full-fledged company town: a development of eventually more than 20 homes for staff onsite, science center, gym and other facilities are in the works, according to correspondence between Musk’s executives and city and state officials that Bloomberg obtained through a public records request.
December 2, 2025 at 3:54 PM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
ProPublica: Wealthy Ranchers Profit From Public Lands. Taxpayers Pick Up the Tab. https://www.propublica.org/article/grazing-ranchers-public-lands-trump
Excerpt: To pull back the curtain on the federal public lands grazing system, ProPublica and High Country News pored over government documents and data gleaned from more than 100 public records requests filed with the Bureau of Land Management, Forest Service and state agencies across the West. We interviewed ranchers, conservationists, researchers and federal rangeland managers. We also toured grazing allotments in Arizona, Colorado, Montana and Nevada. Excerpt: Our list of the largest ranchers on Forest Service land by acreage was compiled by the agency and provided to us in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. We contacted all of the ranchers named as the largest permittees to ask for comment on the accuracy of our findings, and several confirmed that the agency had provided the correct acreage.
December 2, 2025 at 10:03 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
Chicago Tribune: Nearly 1,900 immigrants were detained during the first half of Operation Midway Blitz. Most had no criminal record. https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/01/operation-midway-blitz-criminal-record/
Excerpt: Unlike typical law enforcement agencies, ICE does not release complete lists of those arrested but the agency periodically has been forced to release raw data of its activities under an open records lawsuit. That data has helped document the dramatic escalation of enforcement efforts in Chicago and across the country, although it doesn’t list enough details to make precise measurements of specific enforcement actions.
December 2, 2025 at 12:33 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
404 Media: 404 Media's Cyber Monday Sale! 25% Off! https://www.404media.co/404-medias-cyber-monday-sale-25-off/
Excerpt: We're having a Cyber Monday sale! You can get 25% off an annual subscription. With that, you get access to all of our articles (including today's piece about how surveillance company Flock is using overseas gig workers to review and classify footage); bonus podcast content every week where we talk about an extra story; bonus episodes where we respond to subscribers' best comments; our full archive of FOIA Forums, which are live-streamed events where we teach you how to pry records from the government; behind-the-scenes content every week; and, most importantly, you'll be supporting journalists who quit corporate media and went independent.
December 1, 2025 at 5:18 PM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
The Marshall Project: An Overlooked Source of Information in Missouri Prison Deaths: The Coroner https://www.themarshallproject.org/2025/12/01/st-louis-coroner-missouri-prison-death-investigation
Excerpt: When someone dies in a Missouri prison, the prison system is required to provide certain information to families about the death. Staff should notify emergency contacts of the death and explain how to access the deceased’s medical records, according to the Missouri DOC’s communications director. For more information, families or their attorneys can submit records requests. State law dictates that even if certain records are normally closed, the DOC should provide families access to those documents “for purposes of investigation.” Excerpt: In one instance, an appeals court ordered the DOC to pay a mother over $60,000 in penalties and court fees for failing to provide video footage and the prison’s internal investigation of her son’s suicide in 2021. In another case, a court ordered the DOC to pay $5,000 after ruling that officials “knowingly and purposefully violated” public records law by refusing to provide video and other investigative records to another woman whose son was beaten to death in prison that same year. Excerpt: “They don’t hear back from the Department of Corrections, or they’ll deny a lot of records requests,” said Lori Curry, executive director of the advocacy group Missouri Prison Reform, of families’ experiences with the prison system. “It can really break your spirit to try to find out the truth about something and continually run into brick walls.”
December 1, 2025 at 11:04 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
ProPublica: A Loophole Allows Ranchers to Renew Grazing Permits With Little Scrutiny of the Environmental Impact https://www.propublica.org/article/grazing-environment-public-lands-oversight
Excerpt: A 2024 BLM land health assessment listed the grazing allotment as “ALL STANDARDS MET.” In April, a camouflaged trail camera bearing the agency’s insignia was pointed toward the creek. (ProPublica and High Country News submitted a public records request for images on the camera’s memory card in May, but the BLM has yet to fulfill the request.) Excerpt: We used geospatial data compiled by the conservation group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility to tell us the land health status of BLM allotments. The organization obtained the data, which was last updated in December 2023, from the BLM via a public records request. To determine whether an allotment had been reauthorized for grazing via an environmental review or an exemption, we turned to data compiled by the environmental group Western Watersheds Project in its “Renew or Review” initiative. The organization pulled this data from the BLM’s Rangeland Administration System in September 2023. We then joined the datasets, limiting the analysis to allotments that appeared in both sources.
December 1, 2025 at 10:02 AM
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Chicago Tribune: Daywatch: Illinois soybean farmers struggle with trade war and rising costs https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/11/28/daywatch-illinois-soybean-farmers-struggle-with-trade-war-and-rising-costs/
Excerpt: Roughly seven hours of police body-worn camera footage and 911 call audio were released by the Evanston Police Department last week in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.
November 28, 2025 at 12:33 PM
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Chicago Tribune: Evanston police bodycams show chaos after Halloween clash between Border Patrol agents and community https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/11/28/evanston-halloween-border-patrol-video/
Excerpt: That recording is among the roughly seven hours of police body-worn camera footage and 911 call audio released by the Evanston Police Department last week in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.
November 28, 2025 at 11:05 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
Chicago Tribune: Students at Lincoln-Way West apply to form Club America, a Turning Point USA affiliate https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/11/26/lincoln-way-west-turning-point-usa/
Excerpt: Clausen filed Freedom of Information Act requests for school documents relating to the establishment of the Gay/Straight Alliance, as well as other clubs that had been established more recently.
November 26, 2025 at 11:13 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
404 Media: Here's the Video for Our Seventh FOIA Forum: Flock https://www.404media.co/heres-the-video-for-our-seventh-foia-forum-flock/
Excerpt: The FOIA Forum is a livestreamed event for paying subscribers where we talk about how to file public records requests and answer questions. If you're not already signed up, please consider doing so here. Excerpt: Recently we had a FOIA Forum where we focused on our reporting about Flock. This includes how to file public records requests for audit logs, footage, and other ideas for FOIAing surveillance companies. Excerpt: Check out all of our FOIA Forum archives here. And the video is below.
November 25, 2025 at 6:16 PM
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LA Times: Inglewood Police Department 'systematically' violated state public records law, judge rules https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-11-25/inglewood-police-department-systematically-violated-state-public-records-law-judge-rules
Excerpt: The Inglewood Police Department “systematically” violated state public records laws by disregarding requests for documents related to police misconduct, including fatal shootings, and must now post the information on its website, a judge has ruled. Excerpt: In 2021, the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California sued the department, alleging that it had not produced a single document in response to public records requests made nearly three years before. Excerpt: The ACLU’s public records requests followed a state law, Senate Bill 1421, enacted the previous year that made those types of records publicly available for the first time. Excerpt: In an order issued Thursday, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Gary Tanaka granted the ACLU’s motion for summary judgment, writing that the Inglewood Police Department demonstrated “a pattern and practice of failing to comply with their statutory obligations” under state public records laws.
November 25, 2025 at 11:53 AM
foiafeed.social.freedom.press.ap.brid.gy
ProPublica: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Long a Defender of States’ Rights, Embraces Trump’s Push to Expand Presidential Power https://www.propublica.org/article/greg-abbott-donald-trump-presidential-power-state-rights
Excerpt: Acting on Trump’s order, the Justice Department requested from states their entire voter rolls, including dates of birth, addresses, driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers, according to a letter sent to Texas and obtained by ProPublica and the Tribune under public records laws.
November 24, 2025 at 10:33 AM