SYG - KS District 28

Mike Spies
Via email at requests@muckrock.com<mailto:requests@muckrock.com>

Dear Mr. Spies:

I am a staff attorney with the Kansas Supreme Court Office of Judicial Administration. Please consider this a response to your request for "All Stand Your Ground motions that have been filed by defendants . . . since January 1, 2006." Please note that the particular request before me was addressed to the "Kansas District Attorney - 28th Judicial District." However, please consider this a response to all similar requests made and sent to judicial districts throughout the State of Kansas.

As I have previously informed you, not all judicial districts in Kansas have a position called a district attorney. A district attorney is the chief prosecutor in a judicial district containing only one county, such as Third Judicial District (Shawnee County). Multi-county judicial districts have a chief prosecutor in each county which is known as a county attorney. District/county attorneys are not employees or officials of the district court or the judicial branch of the State of Kansas.

In addition, your correspondence has been sent to the district courts. The district courts are not the records custodians for district/county attorneys in the State of Kansas. As a result, any records requests addressed to district/county attorneys received by any of the 105 district courts in the State of Kansas are hereby denied because they do not have any documents that satisfy your requests.

Your most recent correspondence has included a request pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act. Please note that the Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. § 551 et seq., applies to federal agencies and not state agencies. The district courts are considered to be state agencies for purposes of FOIA. See Lathrop v. Juneau & Associates, 220 F.R.D. 322, 327 (S.D. Ill. 2004). Therefore all your requests pursuant to FOIA are hereby denied.

To summarize, all requests received to date for "Stand Your Ground" motions under the Kansas Opens Records Act and/or the Freedom of Information Act that you have sent to any district court in the State of Kansas since May 1, 2017 are hereby denied.

Should you decide to amend your requests and seek "Stand Your Ground" motions that have been filed with the district courts, those requests will also be denied. The Kansas Open Records Act requires disclosure of information that is part of the public record, which is defined to mean any recorded information, regardless of form, characteristics or location, which is made, maintained or kept by or is in the possession of any public agency, or any officer or employee of a public agency, if it relates to their official duties. K.S.A. 45-217(g)(1). KORA does not require release of records that are prohibited or restricted from disclosure under federal law, state statute or rule of the Kansas Supreme Court. K.S.A. 45-221(a)(1).

A district court does not make, maintain or keep a single record containing the information you request. To the extent this information is available in the public record, providing a response to your request would require gathering of information from various records on individual cases that are maintained and kept by the court. This compiling of information is not permitted under applicable Kansas Supreme Court rules and orders.

First, I call your attention to Kansas Supreme Court Rule 196 dealing with public access to district court electronic case records. Two provisions of Rule 196 have particular application to such a request. First, Rule 196(d)(1) provides that public access to electronic case records or information contained in electronic records "must be available on a case-by-case basis only[.]" Rule 196(a)(2) defines "Case-by-Case Access" to mean "that each electronic case record is available only individually and that when a search for an individual electronic case record returns multiple results, each result may be viewed only individually." Second, Rule 196(e) provides, "Compiled information and bulk distribution will not be available." In Rule 196(a)(1), "Bulk distribution" is defined as "the distribution of all or a significant subset of the information in court case records in electronic form, as is, and without modification or compilation." Rule 196(a)(3) defines "Compiled information" to be "information that is derived from the selection, aggregation, or reformulation of all or a subset of all the information from more than one individual court case record in electronic form." This means cases must be researched individually. The clerk's office will not compile reports or provide information in bulk.

To the extent that your request seeks information that has not been converted to a digital form in order to be considered an electronic case record, you should refer to Supreme Court Administrative Order 189. "[A] request for all court records of a certain type or a significant subset of such records, as opposed to a request for an individual case record, is a bulk request." Kan.Sup.Ct. AO 189. The Order further states that all bulk requests are denied.

In summary, any request to the district courts in the future for all "Stand Your Ground" motions will be denied. "Stand Your Ground" motions are not a type of motion that is readily identifiable in our court files. The court clerks would have to individually review each motion within each case file and make a legal determination regarding whether the motion qualifies as a "Stand Your Ground" motion. Our court employees are not permitted to undertake such an endeavor.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me directly.

John T. Houston
Staff Attorney
Office of Judicial Administration
301 SW 10th Street
Topeka, KS 66612
(785) 296-2019 (direct)
(785) 296-2256 (main)
(785) 296-7076 (fax)

CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE:

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Sir: I am aware you received the following response last week from Mr.
Houston, staff attorney for the Office of Judicial Administration, on behalf
of judicial districts throughout the State of Kansas. Concerning your most
recent request of May 9, 2017, I again refer you to Mr. Houston’s emailed
response.

John Isern

District Court Administrator

20th Judicial District

Mike Spies

Via email at requests@muckrock.com
<mailto:requests@muckrock.com>

Dear Mr. Spies:

I am a staff attorney with the Kansas Supreme Court Office
of Judicial Administration. Please consider this a response to your request
for "All Stand Your Ground motions that have been filed by defendants . . .
since January 1, 2006." Please note that the particular request before me
was addressed to the "Kansas District Attorney – 28th Judicial District."
However, please consider this a response to all similar requests made and
sent to judicial districts throughout the State of Kansas.

As I have previously informed you, not all judicial
districts in Kansas have a position called a district attorney. A district
attorney is the chief prosecutor in a judicial district containing only one
county, such as Third Judicial District (Shawnee County). Multi-county
judicial districts have a chief prosecutor in each county which is known as
a county attorney. District/county attorneys are not employees or officials
of the district court or the judicial branch of the State of Kansas.

In addition, your correspondence has been sent to the
district courts. The district courts are not the records custodians for
district/county attorneys in the State of Kansas. As a result, any records
requests addressed to district/county attorneys received by any of the 105
district courts in the State of Kansas are hereby denied because they do not
have any documents that satisfy your requests.

Your most recent correspondence has included a request
pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act. Please note that the Freedom of
Information Act, 5 U.S.C. § 551 et seq., applies to federal agencies and not
state agencies. The district courts are considered to be state agencies for
purposes of FOIA. See Lathrop v. Juneau & Associates, 220 F.R.D. 322, 327
(S.D. Ill. 2004). Therefore all your requests pursuant to FOIA are hereby
denied.

To summarize, all requests received to date for "Stand Your
Ground" motions under the Kansas Opens Records Act and/or the Freedom of
Information Act that you have sent to any district court in the State of
Kansas since May 1, 2017 are hereby denied.

Should you decide to amend your requests and seek "Stand Your Ground"
motions that have been filed with the district courts, those requests will
also be denied. The Kansas Open Records Act requires disclosure of
information that is part of the public record, which is defined to mean any
recorded information, regardless of form, characteristics or location, which
is made, maintained or kept by or is in the possession of any public agency,
or any officer or employee of a public agency, if it relates to their
official duties. K.S.A. 45-217(g)(1). KORA does not require release of
records that are prohibited or restricted from disclosure under federal law,
state statute or rule of the Kansas Supreme Court. K.S.A. 45-221(a)(1).

A district court does not make, maintain or keep a single record containing
the information you request. To the extent this information is available in
the public record, providing a response to your request would require
gathering of information from various records on individual cases that are
maintained and kept by the court. This compiling of information is not
permitted under applicable Kansas Supreme Court rules and orders.

First, I call your attention to Kansas Supreme Court Rule 196 dealing with
public access to district court electronic case records. Two provisions of
Rule 196 have particular application to such a request. First, Rule
196(d)(1) provides that public access to electronic case records or
information contained in electronic records “must be available on a
case-by-case basis only[.]” Rule 196(a)(2) defines “Case-by-Case Access” to
mean “that each electronic case record is available only individually and
that when a search for an individual electronic case record returns multiple
results, each result may be viewed only individually.” Second, Rule 196(e)
provides, “Compiled information and bulk distribution will not be
available.” In Rule 196(a)(1), “Bulk distribution” is defined as “the
distribution of all or a significant subset of the information in court case
records in electronic form, as is, and without modification or compilation.”
Rule 196(a)(3) defines “Compiled information” to be “information that is
derived from the selection, aggregation, or reformulation of all or a subset
of all the information from more than one individual court case record in
electronic form." This means cases must be researched individually. The
clerk’s office will not compile reports or provide information in bulk.

To the extent that your request seeks information that has not been
converted to a digital form in order to be considered an electronic case
record, you should refer to Supreme Court Administrative Order 189. “[A]
request for all court records of a certain type or a significant subset of
such records, as opposed to a request for an individual case record, is a
bulk request.” Kan.Sup.Ct. AO 189. The Order further states that all bulk
requests are denied.

In summary, any request to the district courts in the future for all "Stand
Your Ground" motions will be denied. "Stand Your Ground" motions are not a
type of motion that is readily identifiable in our court files. The court
clerks would have to individually review each motion within each case file
and make a legal determination regarding whether the motion qualifies as a
"Stand Your Ground" motion. Our court employees are not permitted to
undertake such an endeavor.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me directly.

John T. Houston

Staff Attorney

Office of Judicial Administration

301 SW 10th Street

Topeka, KS 66612

(785) 296-2019 (direct)

(785) 296-2256 (main)

(785) 296-7076 (fax)

To Whom it May Concern:

Please see the original email below, sent to you on May 4, 2017. Please stop
sending requests to the Grant County District Court (620-353-2131) addressed
to Kansas District Attorney. There is no Kansas District Attorney at this
fax number. The Clerk of the District Court does not appreciate the waste of
productivity or paper commodity that addressing your faxes cause.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.