CR Files Shielded?

We aren't seeing much coverage of this, but it seems important:

• In a recent court opinion, issued by United States District Court Magistrate Judge Arlander Keys in Bell v. City of Chicago, Chicago Police Department CR files were deemed protected from public disclosure. Judge Keys explained "the newly-amended FOIA expressly exempts from disclosure records relating to disciplinary adjudications." Section 7(1)(n) of the 2010 FOIA per se exempts from disclosure:

  Records relating to a public body's adjudication of employee grievances or disciplinary cases; however, this exemption shall not extend to the final outcome of cases in which discipline is imposed.

If we're reading this correctly, cases in which discipline was not imposed are not subject to FOIA requests. The last paragraph in this decision says that there is a hearing on 12 March 2010 to establish the Protective Order for officers' disciplinary records. We're thinking that this could have a tremendous effect on those 500-plus officers who were part of that fishing expedition where they had large numbers of unsustained numbers on their records and assorted bottom-feeders who were looking for payouts.

The WrongfulConvictionsLawsuitDefense website appears to list a number of successful defenses of police officers from frivolous lawsuits and outrageous claims of criminal defendants. It makes for some interesting reading.