However, Police Department CPRA Policies May Be Fertile Grounds For Litigation.
In Nelson v. City of San Diego, Case No. D069118 (4th Dist., Div. 1 Oct. 17, 2016) (unpublished), a plaintiff sought fees under the California Public Records Act, Gov. Code, § 6250 et seq., as the prevailing party in a writ proceeding against San Diego. Both the lower and appellate courts concluded fee recovery was not justified where responsive documents had been turned over and there was no showing that San Diego improperly withheld documents from plaintiff.
However, there is an omen that there might be future fertile litigation against police departments complying with CPRA requests. The appellate court noted that police departments often take the position that CPRA requests are limited to information only 30-60 days old. (Fredericks v. Superior Court, 233 Cal.App.4th 209, 221-222 (2015).) Given that CPRA has no time limitation, such policies might be subject to future challenges, even though lower courts can consider the burden of production on governmental agencies with respect to producing older documents. Seems us to that we may see some future decisions on these type of time-limiting policies.