Washington DOC settles e-records suit.

Washington's Department of Corrections (DOC) agreed to pay $65,000 to settle a lawsuit over its refusal to disclose certain public records in electronic form, and it's just the latest payout for the agency over withholding records.

The government is settling the case, according to The Olympian, despite winning a lower-court ruling on an injunction request in June. The decision had been on appeal. The case involves Douglas Moore, a Tacoma, Wash., man who had requested information from numerous state agencies about employees' healthcare coverage status.

Moore had requested related information from about 10 other agencies--all of whom complied by releasing a database allowing him to find out whether part-time and intermittent employees were receiving healthcare benefits. A separate class-action lawsuit filed by Moore is pending in King County over his denial of benefits for three months a year in his job as a race steward for the state Horse Racing Commission.

Assistant Attorney General Peter Berney argued in court that DOC lacked the software needed to transfer the records electronically without disclosing private information, so it offered to make paper copies for $8,900 and said Moore could view them in person and at no charge.

Moore's lawyer, however, told the judge DOC had provided electronic records to another requester--at a cost of $1.04, including 30 cents for a disk and 74 cents for postage--the day before it denied Moore's request. The Olympian reported that Berney said disclosure of electronic records depended upon the records in question.

In June 2007, the agency won in a case before Thurston County Judge Christine Pomeroy, who said the agency must disclose its information but that the requester had no inherent right to get the data in electronic form.

"There is no clear right to electronic copies of documents under the PDA (Public Disclosure Act)," Pomeroy said in her oral ruling. "It is an interesting question. I think it is a question that should be met by the Legislature, not the courts."

Just weeks before that ruling, the DOC had agreed to pay $541,000 in legal fees and frees that resulted from years of denying records to Prison Legal News. The watchdog newspaper, founded by a former inmate, had requested records showing backgrounds of prison medical staff that inflicted injuries on inmates through negligence.

In September 2007, Gov. Chris Gregoire issued a directive to state agency heads, telling them that "when possible" they "should make electronic copies of non-exempt public records available in electronic format."

Regarding the Moore payout, his lawyer issued this written statement: "(G)overnment agencies should see DOC's payment as a warning to not withhold electronic records. DOC could have easily avoided this $65,000 payment by copying the records into a CD for a few dollars when the request was first made."