June 14, 2006 |
2006-R-0368 | |
PUBLIC ACCESS TO COURT PROCEEDINGS AND RECORDS | ||
| ||
By: Sandra Norman-Eady, Chief Attorney | ||
You asked for state laws that permit or require courts to prohibit public access to court records or proceedings.
SUMMARY
We found 25 statutes that either permit or mandate that court records or proceedings be treated confidentially, in contrast to the state's freedom of Information Act (FOIA) that requires public records and proceedings to be available to the public. This report consists of a list of the statutory provisions and a brief description.
The list does not include statutes that (1) require or permit records to be treated confidentially by all agencies, including courts (e. g. , names and addresses of sexual assault victims) or (2) prescribe confidentiality only pursuant to a court order.
We include in the list court records or proceedings that may be open only to specified people or for specified purposes, but not to the general public (e. g. , youth offender proceedings are open to crime victims but not the general public).
To compile this list we searched the Connecticut General Statutes Revised to 2005, the 2006 Supplement to the General Statutes, and the 2006 public acts for the terms “disclosure” and “confidential” (and their derivatives), “1-210,” “Chapter 3,” and “freedom of information” (internal statutory references to the FOIA), and “public record. ”
Table 1 shows the records or proceedings that courts must keep confidential, including limited permissible disclosures, categorized by type.
Table 1: Court Records and Proceedings That Must Be Kept Confidential
Criminal Records | |
CGS § 54-82t |
Any record that the chief state's attorney or a state's attorney reasonably believes would disclose the identity or location of a witness participating in the witness protection program. |
54-142a, c, k, and m |
Nonconviction or erased criminal records |
Juvenile or Youth Records or Proceedings | |
46b-122 |
Juvenile proceedings |
46b-124 |
Records of juvenile matters |
46b-146 |
Erased juvenile delinquency records or records of a member of a family with service needs |
54-76h |
Youthful offender (YO) proceedings |
54-76l |
Records of youths adjudged YO |
54-76o |
Erased YO records |
Probate | |
17a-500 |
Records of cases of people with psychiatric disabilities |
45a-650 |
Medical records filed with the probate court for consideration in any hearing for involuntary representation (appointment of a conservator) |
45a-654 |
Any physician's record filed with the court when considering the appointment of a temporary conservator |
45a-660 |
Any physician's record filed with the court when considering the termination of conservatorship |
Family Matters | |
45a-751b |
Identifying information in termination of parental rights cases without consent |
45a-773 |
Statement that physicians file with probate court after they perform artificial insemination and a child is born |
45a-754 |
Probate court records on termination of parental rights cases, removal of parents as guardians, appointment of statutory parents, and adoption matters |
46b-115s |
Identifying information in a child custody case that would allegedly jeopardize the health, safety, or liberty of a party to, or child involved in, the proceedings |
Grand Jury | |
54-45a |
Grand Jury deliberations |
54-47e |
Orders authorizing a grand jury investigation and the actual investigation |
54-47g |
The results of a grand jury investigation that are not included in the record of the investigation that submitted to the court |
Other | |
38a-913 |
Court proceedings and judicial reviews under the Model Insurers Rehabilitation and Liquidation Act against a delinquent insurer |
51-232 |
Contents of a completed juror questionnaire |
54-41j |
Applications and orders for wiretaps and electronic surveillance |
SNE: ts