On Monday, April 23, within hours of Democratic state rep Anthony Deluca filing a bill to amend Illinois’s Freedom of Information law, a crescendo of opposition arose from civil rights lawyers and government transparency advocates. The amendment would’ve made misconduct complaints against police officers (and other records associated with pending criminal cases) off-limits in FOIA requests. Dozens of opponents filed witness slips, written statements, against this suggested change, and ultimately DeLuca backed down: he decided he would not be calling the bill for a debate.
Advocates who protested the proposed amendment say law enforcement representatives and other special interest groups regularly lobby for changes to Illinois’s FOIA law that would make it harder to learn about officers’ alleged misconduct. The arguments for these changes often rest on protecting officers’ privacy or safeguarding the integrity of criminal investigations.
Topic also points out that the amendment filed by DeLuca would not serve the public because it would prevent people from finding out details about crimes committed in their communities. Any documents pertaining to a crime (beyond arrest reports, which become public through the courts) would be off-limits. “You would not get the witness accounts of what happened, you would not get the video of what happened,” Topic emphasizes. “You would only get whatever the story the police were telling about what happened.”
