Justices: Police in Ohio must release initial work on cases

Police officers' initial observations of a possible crime and witness statements taken that day are public records that must be disclosed, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

The Ohio Supreme Court, in a 5-2 decision, ruled that the Chillicothe Police Department couldn't refuse to turn over "supplemental narratives" from crime reports, which included details such as witness statements from the suspected crime scene.

The department initially denied a request from the Scioto Valley Guardian to turn over these records, saying they were exempt from disclosure as "confidential law-enforcement investigatory records."

The court ruled that interviews conducted days later were not public records and police could still redact certain information from initial reports, such as Social Security numbers or medical information.

The Guardian's editor Derek Myers was awarded $1,800 for the city's failure to promptly disclose the incident reports. The court denied his attorney's fees. Justice Patrick F. Fischer agreed with the decision but would not have awarded the money.

Justice Sharon Kennedy, who is running for chief justice as a Republican, agreed that Chillicothe police should have handed over the records, but she wrote that the majority needlessly complicated a standard settled almost 30 years ago.

Changing the definition to include "when a report is created and how a police department maintains the record will certainly cause confusion and spur litigation for years to come," Kennedy wrote in a dissent joined by Justice Pat Dewine, also a Republican.

Jessie Balmert is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Akron Beacon Journal, Cincinnati Enquirer, Columbus Dispatch and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.