I turned in my complaints against the city earlier today. I then walked to the courthouse and turned one in against the county deputy involved as well.
The request for public records was next located at the 911-dispatch center, which is about a mile out of town. I decided to walk, (not wanting to be caught dead driving around right now... ha, ha).
Well, the dispatch center director was in and he read my request for the 911 tape. He asked if I was a defendant in a case. I told him no.
He invited me inside of the secure building so he could look up if the 911 tape was now considered public record.
We made small talk about cell phone locators during 911 calls. He voiced his concern about voice over internet 911 calls.
Getting back to my request, he stated he believed that it was public record because there was a note with it that said the case had been closed the evening of the incident. He tried getting on the phone with the city police to find out if they had any objections to releasing it as a matter of public record. He could not get a hold of the officer in charge of the case, but came to the conclusion that the tape was public record. He said, well, I’ll let you listen to the tape first and then you can decide if you would like to pay for your own copy.
After a little searching past a horse on the roadway call and others, we reached one starting out like this:
911 Operator: 911?
Caller: Yeah, I was wondering about the laws on conceal carrying a handgun?
911 Operator: Well, you should be directing your call to this agency… blah, blah, blah.
Caller: Oh.
911 Operator: So, you should ask them this question, (911 operator going for the hang-up).
Caller: But, the reason I called was that I just had a customer in my store that had a .45 stuck in the front of his pants “cocked, locked and loaded.” He wasn’t doing anything, but I was wondering about the law.
911 Operator: (Now interested). Where was he? Do you know him? What was he wearing? Did you see where he was going? You said it was cocked? We are sending an officer out now. Do you want to be contacted?
Well, plenty of reasonable suspicion of a LEGAL activity there. The 911-call was better then I thought.
I asked if there were any other calls on this incident. The director took a closer look at his computer screen, (it was a very large flat screen), trying to find another call. He said he didn’t have one. He then noticed an entry that the case had been reopened only 30 minutes earlier at 2:25 pm today. Now he was unsure of what to do.
So, he got on the phone with the city police and started asking question. I overheard as the director said, “I see no reason to not let this phone call go out as public record. What do you think?” About 30 seconds of listening, then, “Oh, I see. Yes, then this is most certainly not available for public record.”
I was trying to hold in my laughter.
He got off the phone and said request denied because there is currently an active investigation. I cannot tell you anything more.
I held in my laughter again, stood up and got ready to leave. He asked if I wanted my request for public records back. I asked him to please make his denial of public records in writing. He said he would send me a letter. I walked home.
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