Any citizen can visit any court or government, look at lawsuits and records, make copies and share them with the rest of the public. Many of these records are available online as well, especially in bigger jurisdictions.
Almost all court records, lawsuits and filings are public record the moment they are filed, unless they are sealed by the court or are excluded as “confidential.”
Police reports and arrest records are also public in Arizona. Many police reports we publish are sent from the investigating or arresting agency or we contact the agency at the scene to get details on a police or emergency incident we respond to.
For events like fires and car accidents, Sedona police officers and Sedona Fire District battalion chiefs usually provide us with enough details at the scene to get a story on our website or social media pages quickly and accurately when our reporters and photojournalists are in the field.
The Arizona Judicial Branch maintains a website where police and court records are publicly accessible. The site includes everything from traffic tickets and civil lawsuits to murder trials and, in many cases, court minutes from individual cases are also available. We often use this website to spell check the name of a suspect in a police report or get updated information about charges or sentencing, although we also speak with police agencies, court clerks and civil litigants to get the full details for a story; the site is merely a fact-checking backup.
The First Amendment protects not just journalists but anyone who takes photos or videos of a police or fire scene on public property — such as a public road — so long as they don’t interfere with first responders. You don’t need permission to take photo or video of anyone — in uniform or not — on public property whether you’re a journalist or a private citizen.
Does a court case have merit? Is the plaintiff in the right or wrong? Are any or all or none of the named defendants at fault? Is an arrested person guilty of a crime or wrongly accused? That’s not up for any newspaper to decide — that’s a matter for the court, but does not change the fact that arrest or lawsuit remains a public record.
As a newspaper, one of our primary duties is to publish such records like public notices, government budgets and police reports. Other items are also public record, like emails sent by members of the Sedona- Oak Creek School District Governing Board, Sedona City Council, Sedona Fire District Governing Board or Yavapai County Board of Supervisors, as well as the contracts of the administrators of public bodies, such as employment contracts of public officials.
Any citizen can request public records from a government office and if they want very specific, in-depth records, they can file a formal Arizona Public Records Law request from said agency. We advise those who do to be very specific with what they request, so they get what the want without wasting their time and the time of our public employees who already have a heavy workload running our various governments. Remember that government workers are paid by our tax dollars, so don’t waste our tax money filing massive records requests when looking for answers to a very specific question.
While we may distrust politicians by nature, the public employees who work for our governments are in for the long haul regardless of who is in power. They want the public to be satisfied with their government and, more often than not, are willing to assist members of the public understand how their tax dollars are being spent. A phone call to a clerk or department head generally can get an answer accurately and quickly so rather than bash the local “government” for perceived problems, pick up the phone and get questions answered.
We strongly encourage interested citizens to review the Arizona Public Records Law from the Arizona Ombudsman’s Office, as well as Arizona Supreme Court’s “Public Access to the Judicial Records of the State of Arizona,” both available online.
The public has every right to know what their governments are doing and government workers are willing to help.
— Christopher Fox Graham
Managing Editor
