VA HB 1087 Reported Dead (Closed Some Public Records)

  The Virginia legislature’s HB 1087 provided “that the social security number of any individual contained in the public records of a local government shall be confidential and exempt from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act. The bill provides, however, that a social security number may be released (i) in accordance with a proper judicial order; (ii) to any law-enforcement agency, officer, or authorized agent thereof acting in the performance of official law-enforcement duties;”

PIAVA advised the appropriate committees and individual legislators that DCJS licensed security businesses and private investigators should have access to identifying data in court records to ensure “due process of law” and fair trails in civil and criminal litigation matters.  Our reasoning is that a “fair trial” is a constitutional issue.  If the Commonwealth Attorney (Prosecutor) and the law enforcement have access to identifying data in public records, private investigators should have the same access so that a person’s right to a “fair trial” is not compromised. 

PIAVA attended several sub-committee hearings on the bill.  Richmond Sunlight Click Here, reports that HB 1087 was finally referred to the General Laws Committee where it remains today.  They report that the bill is dead. 

PIAVA hopes that the legislature will work to ensure fairness in access to public records while at the same time safeguarding an individual’s right to privacy.  PIAVA is prepared to assist the legislature or offer any helpful information for insight into the private investigation industry.

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Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.
McLean, VA

Need To Find Someone? Webinar On Finding People March 4 Noon

  Free Webinar on Finding People Information

Donna Fryer, who has been intricately involved in the information research industry for almost 20 years, is offering a free webinar titled Finding People Information: Free Sources and Web 2.0.  Research projects, business development, sales calls, recruiting and often  due diligence requires quick research on individuals.  The webinar explores free, quick sources and Web 2.0 sources.Title: “Finding People Information: Free Sources and Web 2.0″

Date:  Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Time:  12:00 PM – 12:30 PM EST  Register now by clicking the link below:
Register Here

For more on Donna and her company visit www.searchitright.com

I have spoken with Donna and she knows what she is talking about.  She has lots of experience in research and digging out the “hard to find” information everyone so desperately wants.

Learn from the best.

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.
McLean, VA

 

Ask Bill! A Great Legal Research & Reference Site

  Thanks to AbsTacked for calling attention to Ask Bil, the great site with the great name:

“Ask Bill!” See Best Internet Law Library

Ask Bill provides links to legal information on the Internet for legal researchers in the Seventh Circuit and elsewhere–suitable for finding legal stuff.  The sites have been reviewed, selected and annotated.  Official government sites have been selected wherever possible.

Good site.

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.
McLean, VA

Super Search Engine–Visual, Intuitive–Try It

  Need another search engine?  I always use several search engines in researching a case.  All have unique search capabilities.  Quintura is interesting and entertianing in that you have visual interaction.  Try it out. Click Here quintura.com

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.
McLean, VA

US Case Law–Ever Need To Find A Court Opinion?

  Ever need to research the “law?”  Go Public Libray of Law. This is a great place to research case law in various courts in the US.  Another law search engine I just discovered is precydent.com. I have not looked at this s/e as much as others, but try it our and let me know if it works.  See also, Cleveland Marshall College of Law More Legal Research Sites

From the site:

“Searching the Web is easy.  Why should searching the law be any different? That’s why Fastcase has created the Public Library of Law — to make it easy to find the law online. PLoL is the largest free law library in the world, because we assemble law available for free scattered across many different sites — all in one place. PLoL is the best starting place to find law on the Web.

What is available on PLoL?
Cases from the U.S. Supreme Court and Courts of Appeals
Cases from all 50 states back to 1997
Federal statutory law and codes from all 50 states
Regulations, court rules, constitutions, and more!”

Good searching to you.

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

McLean, VA

Pellicano–Hollywood’s PI Trial Soon

  L.A. lawyer Terry Christensen to be tried separately from Pellicano

By Greg Krikorian
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

February 20, 2008

Prominent Los Angeles entertainment attorney Terry N. Christensen will be tried separately from private investigator Anthony Pellicano and his other co-defendants, a federal judge ruled Tuesday, just days before Hollywood’s big wiretapping trial was set to begin. The decision by U.S. District Judge Dale S. Fischer removes the only marquee name from the list of defendants in the long-awaited trial, which is slated to start Feb. 27 with jury selection.  Read Whole StoryBill LowranceBill Lowrance President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.
McLean, VA

Public Court Records Access In Danger?

  From the Capital Blog, Ohio, Capital Blog, a view of public records and access to court records from the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Ohio.  Ohio’s Supreme Court has drafted rules for public access to court records.  See draft Supreme Court of Ohio Rules. 

Chief Justice Moyer writes a good explanation of issues facing courts today and how much “public” court information and filings should be available for access via the internet or at the courthouse.   The Ohio Supreme Court rules govern how the public accesses court records.  Before the internet, many, many years ago, anyone could go to the courthouse and comb through all public records filings.  

Public records are valuable resources for the news media, public and private investigators, genealogists and other researchers.  With advent of the internet and the availability of public record information on-line, private information contained in public records is for the taking by a click of the mouse.  Where is the line drawn for public access to public records and electronic access to private information contained in public records.  This is the issue the Ohio Supreme Court is addressing. 

I quickly read over the proposed rules, and the Court is trying to balance the access to public records while still protecting electronic access to private information contained in some public records.  While availability of public record information may be limited through internet access, it is important to maintain complete access to public records at the courthouse. 

The Virginia Supreme Court conducted a similar effort last year in proposing amended rules for accessing court records.  See Prior Post  The Virginia Supreme Court, as well as the Ohio Supreme Court, allows subjects of a case to request limited public access.  If a person is conducting research at the courthouse and the record is limited, the researcher will have to request the court’s permission to access the redacted information.  How is this accomplished?  No answer is available at this time.

Now, below is a quote Chief Justice Moyer emphasized, so true, so true:   

“Public records are the people’s records. The officials in whose custody they happen to be are mere trustees for the people . . .”  So wrote Judge Rufus B. Smith of the Superior Court of Cincinnati (a body that no longer exists) in 1901.

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

Virginia Legislature–Know The Ins and Outs

     From Richmond Sunlight (Richmond Sunlight)  – a great site:

  “Interested in visiting the General Assembly? We’re exactly halfway finished with the sixty day session, so you’ve got a month left. The legislature’s website provides all sorts of information that will help you with your visit, including how to plan your visit, how to get an official tour, and how to testify before a committee. There’s even an extensive protocol guide, providing a Miss Manners-style guide to how to address legislators, how to invite the governor to an event, and how to mourn the death of a sitting legislator. (Let’s hope you won’t need to know that last one.) If all else fails, contact one of your legislators. He’ll be happy to help you plan your visit.”

Also at the site you can follow various bills, committee meetings, get to know your representative and how to contact them.  Keep active and learn what the Virginia Legislature has in mind for you.

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

Want To Find Public Records Online?

  This is good site to start and look for basics of finidng public records online.  Check it out.  It is not the professional investigator, but for the “do it yourselfers” take a look.

A quote from the site:

A brief note

All of the following web sites and methods of discovery are absolutely free, unless stated otherwise. There are many sites out there that advertise themselves as being free, but charge for their services – and they are not providing anything that you can’t find yourself. If you do end up having to pay for something, it will most likely be at a physical location (i.e., a courthouse) in order to procure a copy of a particular public record

Where-to-find-public-records-online

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

Horse Cruelty In Virginia–Continued

  Loudoun County, VA:

Trainer Indicted After Malnourished Horses Seized

Washington Post Story

Follow up to

Prior Post Horses Virginia

A Loudoun County grand jury indicted horse trainer Dennis B. Danley yesterday on 48 counts of animal cruelty, a Class I misdemeanor, Commonwealth’s Attorney James E. Plowman said.

He faces up to a year in jail and $2,500 fine on each count. The charges were brought in connection with the seizure of four dozen thoroughbreds by Loudoun County officials Jan. 22 from a Middleburg area farm. The animals were found to be severely malnourished and without drinking water.

Danley said last night that he stopped working on the farm in November, owned no horses and is not responsible for their condition.

Oh well, the usual animal cruelty in Virginia.  At least there are legal proceedings in existence.

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

Holy Shocker, Batman–TSA Positive Blog Response?

  It is reported by Wired Blog that, in a first for the federal governmnet, TSA responded to complaints and questions on its new Blog by actually changing the offending policy. 

On Monday, fliers asked the TSA’s new blog Evolution of Security why some airports were requiring passengers to remove all electronics – MP3 players, cell phones and even power cords – from their carry-on bags.  TSA looked into the issue and found it was various “rogue” offices that came up with the search plans.  TSA Bloggers investigated, found the “non-standard” policy offenders and stopped the “electronics” plifering type practice. 

Well, maybe the TSA Blog is a good idea.  Hopefully, more positive results will occur in the future.

 Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

TSA Blog–Oh No–What Air Travelers Love to Hate

  Like to travel?  Like being body searched by TSA?  This Blog is for you.  TSA says about their new blog “This blog is sponsored by the Transportation Security Administration to facilitate an ongoing dialogue on innovations in security, technology and the checkpoint screening process.”  Ummm, very clear.  TSA Blog

You got to read people’s comments.  I predict TSA will be sorry in the future for putting up this blog and will take it down.Spend some time at this Blog reading comments from the public about TSA’s inconsistent rules, policies. 

For example, look at the question posed about “Why do you screen/search old people and children?”  TSA’s answer is a video by one of its employees explaining how old people wore bombs and blew up facilities somewhere in the world.  Next it talks about kids wearing bombs and blowing up facilities somewhere in the world–not in the US mind you. 

 Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

State Agency Databases All 50 States

  This is convenient site to check for all the various State’s databases.  The site is put together by the American Library Association ALA (A great resource)  The site says:

“In every US State and the District of Columbia, agencies are creating databases of useful information – information on businesses, licensed professionals, plots of land, even dates of fish stocking. Some of this content is available on search engines, but much of it is part of the invisible web.

In any event, no resource we’re aware of has tried to pull together all publicly accessible state agency databases until now. Eventually each state page below will have a page listing state government databases by agency. If this project gets a wily programmer, we can talk subject access or even federated search. Click on a state name from the list to find a list of databases by agency. This is a wiki, so if you don’t see something on a list that should be, feel free to add it as long as the resource is meant to be available to the public and is produced by a government entity in the listed state.”

Check it out.  ALA State Agency Databases

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.

Great Potential–Crime Reports

  Thanks to AbsTracked for this item.

Crime Reports is a crime reporting system for various jurisdictions.  The information comes from law enforcement agencies and is easily searchable for the latest crime reports for your area.  Unfortunately, Virginia is not one of the states included in this system yet, but I bet the system will grow and expand over the coming months.  The site says: ”The CrimeReports.com service provides law enforcement agencies with an affordable and easy-to-use Web-based service for managing and controlling the sharing of crime data with the public, in near real-time. Community members can then access their neighborhood crime information for free, empowering them to make informed decisions to help improve the safety of their families, friends, property and the community at large.”

Currently, the following states have cities/counties participating in this on-line program:Arizona, California, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, Ohio, Texas, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin. 

Many local jurisdictions in Virginia have the crime reports on the local law enforcement web sites.  You can check Fairfax County Police at Fairfax County Police crime

Check it out.

Bill Lowrance

President PIAVA

Information Insights Inc.