Mr. Kim,
I retired as Clerk on January 31, I am forwarding your request to Sean J. Gallagher, City Clerk.
Sorry for any delay, I have just been brought back to work.

Robert Byrne
Department of Administration
280 Grove Street
Jersey City, NJ 07302
201.547.5149

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Dear Taeho Kim ,

Thank you for registering with the Jersey City OPRA Center. Below you will
find your login and password information. Please log in to the [2]Open
Public Records Center to update any contact or password information and to
track the progress of your requests.

Please note that, due to the active state of emergency in relation to
COVID-19, the City of Jersey City will not be able to respond to OPRA
requests within seven (7) business days. The City appreciates your
patience during this difficult time.
Login: [OPRA #12779 email]
 
Password:  [3]Update Password
 
If you are a first time user and did not submit your request through the
open public records portal but are receiving this e-mail, an account has
been created for you where you can access, track and receive any documents
in response to your request.
 
Thank You,
 
Custodian of Records
Jersey City, NJ
 
 
 
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Dear Taeho Kim :

Thank you for your interest in open public records of Jersey City OPRA
Center.  This will serve to acknowledge receipt of your Open Public
Records Act (OPRA) request.  Your request was received in this office on
7/8/2020.  Kindly refer to the reference number R001802-070820 when
communicating with our office in this regard.  Your request mentioned:

Records requested: 1. A list of all lawsuits and cases in which any
officer of the police department was involved between 2012 and 2019.
For each lawsuit/case, please provide the date (month and year) of the
alleged incident at issue, whether the alleged incident was excessive
force, settlement amount (if any), and final compensation amount ruled
(if any). 2. Please provide copies of the complaint in any lawsuits
and cases described in above.

Your request will be forwarded to the relevant City department(s) to
locate the information you seek and to determine the volume and any costs
associated with satisfying your request. You will be contacted about the
availability and/or provided with copies of the records in question.
 PLEASE NOTE: The State Public Information Act does not require a
governmental body to create new information, to do legal research, or to
answer questions.

Reference is made to your OPRA request captioned above. Please note that,
due to the state of emergency in relation to COVID-19, the City of Jersey
City will not be able to respond to OPRA requests within seven (7)
business days. Therefore, an additional thirty (30) days are needed for
the processing of your request. The City appreciates your patience during
this difficult time.

You can track and monitor the progress of your request at the link below
and you'll receive an email when your request has been completed. Again,
thank you for using the Jersey City OPRA Center.

Jersey City, NJ

══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════

To monitor the progress or update this request please log into
the [1]Jersey City OPRA Center.

References

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RE: OPEN PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST of July 08, 2020, Reference #
R001802-070820

Taeho Kim:

The City received a public information request from you on July 08, 2020.
Your request mentioned:

Records requested:

1. A list of all lawsuits and cases in which any officer of the police
department was involved between 2012 and 2019. For each lawsuit/case,
please provide the date (month and year) of the alleged incident at
issue, whether the alleged incident was excessive force, settlement
amount (if any), and final compensation amount ruled (if any).

2. Please provide copies of the complaint in any lawsuits and cases
described in above.

Reference is made to your OPRA request captioned above. Please note that,
due to the state of emergency in relation to COVID-19, an additional
thirty (30) days are needed for the processing of your request. The City
appreciates your patience during this difficult time.

Sincerely,

Amanda Bransky

RMC, CMR

Office of City Clerk

 
 
 
 
  To monitor the progress or update this request please log into [3]GovQA
the [2]Jersey City OPRA Center. logo

References

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  [1]GovQA logo
 
 
RE: OPEN PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST of July 08, 2020, Reference #
R001802-070820

Taeho Kim:

The City received a public information request from you on July 08, 2020.
Your request mentioned:

Records requested:

1. A list of all lawsuits and cases in which any officer of the police
department was involved between 2012 and 2019. For each lawsuit/case,
please provide the date (month and year) of the alleged incident at
issue, whether the alleged incident was excessive force, settlement
amount (if any), and final compensation amount ruled (if any).

2. Please provide copies of the complaint in any lawsuits and cases
described in above.

Please note that “the purpose of OPRA ‘is to make identifiable
[non-exempt] government records 'readily accessible for inspection,
copying, or examination’.” Jersey Builders Ass’n v. New Jersey Council on
Affordable Housing, 390 N.J. Super. 166, 176 (App. Div. 2007) OPRA does
“not require record custodians to conduct research among its records . . .
and correlate data from various government records in the custodian's
possession." MAG Entertainment, LLC v. Division of Alcoholic Beverage
Control, 375 N.J. Super. 534, 546-47 (App. Div. 2005) Nor does it “require
the records custodian to undertake a subjective analysis.” Paff v.
Galloway Twp., 162 A.3d 1046, 1055, 229 N.J. 340, 355 (2017). Requests
requiring a custodian to “collect, evaluate, and compile information” from
separate files, in effect, amount “to an improper demand for research.”
MAG, supra. 375 N.J. Super. at 540. Further, where records either do not
exist or are not in the custodian's possession, there is “of necessity, no
denial of access at all." Bent, supra. 381 N.J. Super. at 38.

The City does not maintain lists of the type that you are seeking. So,
attempting to fulfill part 1 of your request would require creation of a
new record, and compiling that record would be necessary to determine the
scope of part 2 of your request. Further, attempting to fulfill either
parts 1 or 2 of your request would require conducting a significant
analysis, including having City employees make subjective determinations,
on nearly a decade worth of settled litigation files.

This amounts to an improper research request, rather than the simple
search for records contemplated by OPRA. Accordingly, it is outside of
OPRA’s scope and properly deniable thereunder.

In the cooperative spirit of OPRA, however, the City would be able to
provide you with settlement agreements themselves, which would allow you
to conduct your own analysis and extract whatever information from them
you desire. You could then get the corresponding complaints directly from
the courts in which they were filed. The City would, in that case, simply
ask that you narrow the date range of your request, especially since
certain of the older documents may in storage and difficult to locate and
retrieve.

Please advise as to whether the proposal above is acceptable. Otherwise,
your request is denied.

Sincerely,

Amanda Bransky

RMC, CMR

Office of City Clerk

 
 
 
 
  To monitor the progress or update this request please log into [3]GovQA
the [2]Jersey City OPRA Center. logo

References

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