UCI IP, Arts & Tech Clinic

Intellectual Property, Arts, & Technology Clinic

IPAT’s Press Freedom Project Assists with New Public Database Disclosing Once-Secret Records of Police Shootings and Misconduct; 1.5 million pages of police records now public

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August 4, 2025
Irvine, California

Public records about police shootings and misconduct — some 1.5 million pages obtained from nearly 500 law enforcement agencies across California — will now be searchable by the public for the first time, thanks to records obtained with the help of IPAT’s Press Freedom Project and a new database built by UC Berkeley and Stanford University and published today by the Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, KQED and CalMatters.

The database — the first of its kind in the nation — will vastly expand public access to internal affairs records that disclose how law enforcement agencies throughout the state handle misconduct allegations, police shootings, and other uses of police force that result in death or serious injury.

Go here to access the Police Records Access Project database.

The database, funded by the State of California, currently has records from nearly 12,000 cases, including thousands involving police shootings.

While most agencies obeyed state public records laws and provided the records requested by reporters from the California Reporting Project, a coalition of news organizations across the state, some law enforcement agencies initially resisted.

UC Irvine School of Law Adjunct Law Professor Susan E. Seager worked with law students at the law school’s Press Freedom Project, part of the Intellectual Property, Arts, and Technology Clinic, to pry these once-secret police reports loose from those law enforcement agencies that initially refused to turn over the records.

“The agencies eventually came around and released the records after UCI law students wrote letters explaining how the law, California Penal Code section 832.7(b), requires all law enforcement agencies in California to release records of police shootings, other serious uses of force, and certain types of misconduct,” said Professor Seager, who founded the Press Freedom Project in 2018. The clinical program offers real-life legal training to law students as they provide free legal help to small news outlets, non-profits news organizations, and freelance journalists make Public Records Act requests, gag orders, sealed court records, and lawsuits under the supervisor of Professor Seager.

The UCI law students who worked on the project include Juliana Rosenfeld, Ryan Cantrell, Benjamin Fried, Morgan Chall, Bonnie Wong, Catherine Hilgen, Delara Abbasi, and Clara Gaied.

“Transparency is vital but not always accessible,” said Ms. Wong, who worked for the New York Times before enrolling at UC Irvine School of Law. “This database is the result of journalists who worked tirelessly but whose efforts were often frustrated in the process. Our clinic’s work highlights that the very law gives journalists and the public access to crucial records.”

“As a law student, seeing how the law can be used as a tool to make real changes was empowering,” Ms. Rosenfeld said. “Not only is the law something that we as individuals must follow, but it is also something we can harness to hold law enforcement and government bodies accountable.”

Every record in the database was released by a law enforcement agency in compliance with Penal Code section 832.7(b) and the California Public Records Act. As a result, journalists, scholars, lawyers, and members of the public will now be able to search statewide for particular types of misconduct and use-of-force. Police chiefs will be able to use the data to aid in hiring decisions. Researchers will be able to identify trends and patterns.

The database, called the Police Records Access Project, is the product of years of work by a multidisciplinary team of journalists, data scientists, lawyers and civil liberties advocates, led by the Berkeley Institute for Data Science (BIDS), UC Berkeley Journalism’s Investigative Reporting Program (IRP) and Stanford University’s Big Local News. Other key contributors include the ACLU Foundation of Southern California, California Innocence Organizations, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, UC Irvine law school’s Press Freedom Project and UC Berkeley law school’s Criminal Law &
Justice Center.

The team systematically collected, organized and vetted millions of public records, used emerging technologies such as generative AI to build the database, and created from scratch a searchable user-interface.

“The creation of a public facing database is critical for all of the stakeholders in the criminal legal system: whether public defenders, innocence organizations, prosecutors, police departments or academics,” said Barry Scheck, co-founder and special counsel to the Innocence Project and a professor of law at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law. “This information can be used to understand the system and reform it.”

“Here we have an amazing example of how generative AI — with humans in the loop — can be used for good, at a scale that’s unprecedented, for a task that’s never been done before and for societal impact,” said Aditya Parameswaran, an associate professor at UC Berkeley’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences who led work on the database at BIDS.

Creation of the database was made possible by a series of landmark laws adopted recently by the state of California to improve transparency around law enforcement. Through S.B. 1421, approved in 2018, and S.B. 16, approved in 2021 and codified as Penal Code section 832.7(b), California made records related to uses of force and misconduct accessible to the public for the first time. However, requesting these documents through the Public Records Act required going agency by agency, a laborious process that has made it impossible until now to identify trends and patterns across the state.

“For 40 years California hid police misconduct,’’ said former state Sen. Nancy Skinner, who helped lead the legislative push for the new transparency laws and played a key role in securing state funding to create the database. “We were able to open those records to the public when the legislature passed S.B. 1421 in 2019. Now with this new database, Californians will have even better access, making it easier to find out which law enforcement officers have a history of bad behavior and which of our police departments do the right thing to hold their officers accountable.’’

“This living database makes the transparency and accountability aims of S.B. 1421 a reality. The information it contains spans decades and will be a vital tool in holding agencies and officers accountable for their misconduct and abuse,” said Tiffany Bailey, senior staff attorney at the ACLU Foundation of Southern California, which will contribute an additional 200,000 records to the database from its own efforts to obtain public records. “Critically, families who have lost loved ones in California will now have direct access to the information they need to seek meaningful accountability that has too often been denied.”

The database released today can now be accessed online via KQED, The San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times and CalMatters. The database does not include audio recordings or videos, and additional steps were taken to redact or remove graphic imagery along with personal information about sexual assault or domestic violence victims.

Work on the database began in 2018, when journalists in some 40 newsrooms formed the California Reporting Project and began sharing documents obtained through records requests. Early funding to support this work was provided by the Sony Foundation and Roc Nation. In all, reporters sent more than 3,500 public records requests to nearly 700 police departments, district attorney offices, sheriff’s offices, oversight agencies, probation, corrections and coroners all across the state. “The idea was to collaborate among organizations to build up this system, to make it easy to access these public records,’’ said Cheryl Phillips, founder of Stanford’s Big Local News, which specializes in helping local newsrooms incorporate data into their reporting.

The California Reporting Project has produced more than 100 stories to date from these records. Leading contributors to the California Reporting Project include the Bay Area News Group/Southern California News Group, CapRadio, KPCC/LAist and the newsrooms publishing the database today. Additional newsrooms are expected to publish the database as part of a broader rollout effort, and new features and tools will be added to the database as they are developed by the Police Records Access Project.
“Making police misconduct records more transparent, searchable, and accessible to the public is a monumental leap for accountability,” said Lisa Wayne, executive director of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

For more information about the Police Records Access Project, please contact David Barstow, Investigative Reporting Program chair, through Andrea Lampros, UC Berkeley Journalism’s communications director: 510.847.4469, alampros@berkeley.edu or journalism@berkeley.edu.

For more information about the role played by UC Irvine School of Law’s Press Freedom Project, contact Professor Susan E. Seager, Tel: (949) 824-4234 / sseager1.clinic@law.uci.edu.

UCI Press Freedom Project wins disclosure of court records in high-profile prosecution of DA Diana Teran

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Los Angeles County’s Hall of Justice, the administrative headquarters of both the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office, and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. (Matt Tinoco/LA Public Press)

Petition for Writ of Prohibition

The IPAT Clinic’s Press Freedom Project won the disclosure of court records during the summer of 2024 in the controversial criminal prosecution of a deputy Los Angeles district attorney, Diana Teran.

The Project’s Adjunct Professor Susan E. Seager, assisted by UC Irvine law student Jake Bulf, filed a successful motion to unseal an affidavit and another successful motion to unseal a series of court exhibits in Los Angeles Superior Court on behalf of our client the Los Angeles Public Press, an independent news website reporting about Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Times joined the second unsealing request. The two news organizations argued that the First Amendment required the court records to be open to the public so the public could monitor the case.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Mary Lou Villar ordered the unsealing of an investigator’s affidavit in June 2024 and Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Sam Ohta ordered the unsealing of court exhibits on August 20, 2024. The Court of Appeal rejected  the prosecutors’ emergency request to block the unsealing on September 13, 2024. See Teran – Court of Appeal 9 13 24 Order.

The unsealed exhibits undermine Attorney General Rob Bonta’s allegation that Teran allegedly “hacked” confidential disciplinary records several Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department deputies to research their possible misconduct. In fact, the records reveal that the records used by Teran are actually copies of public court records filed in the Los Angeles Superior Court civil courthouse after the deputies filed legal challenges to their discipline.

The Project’s work was featured in a major story in the Los Angeles Times, in which Press Freedom Project director Professor Susan Seager was quoted:

“This just shows how Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta has wasted the time of several Los Angeles judges by asking them to keep these court records secret,” said Susan Seager, the UC Irvine law professor who has been fighting on behalf of the L.A. Public Press for the release of the deputies’ names since May. “Anyone can go to the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse today and find all the deputy lawsuits challenging their discipline and post them online. What happens in our public courts belongs to the public.”

While this is an important victory for transparency and accountability, the case is not over. We are still fighting to unseal other court records in the case.

Read the full L.A. Public Press story here: Judge unseals DOJ affidavit in Diana Teran case after LA Public Press motion

As the L.A. Times reported:

One deputy was convicted of driving drunk with a loaded gun in the car. Another was suspended for failing to promptly report an on-duty traffic accident. An experienced detective was accused of lying on his job application. And a commander was demoted to captain for turning a blind eye to a cheating scandal in a popular law enforcement relay race.

For five months, California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta’s office has fought to keep secret the names of eight Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies at the center of the case against Diana Teran, a top district attorney’s office advisor accused of misusing confidential personnel records as part of an effort to track cops with disciplinary histories. She is now facing six felony charges under what legal experts say is a “novel” use of the state’s hacking statute.

Courtroom testimony during a preliminary hearing last month showed that the allegedly confidential records in question were actually court records. But state prosecutors still fought to hide the deputies’ names and the details of their past behavior by redacting identifying portions of key documents in the case.”

Read the full L.A. Times story here: Spotty redactions and public records reveal names of deputies in case against D.A. advisor.

Here is the Press Freedom’s motion to unseal the court exhibits (an ex parte application, actually).

UPDATE: 

Court of Appeal Issues OSC for Dismissal of Case

In an extraordinary move, the California Court of Appeal, Second District, has agreed to hear Teran’s emergency legal challenge to her prosecution — before her trial! Here is the court’s December 23, 2024 order:

“GOOD CAUSE APPEARING THEREFOR, you are ordered to show cause before this court in its courtroom at 300 South Spring Street, Los Angeles, California 90013, on April 2, 2025, why the relief prayed for in the petition for writ of prohibition should not be granted. “

Here is Teran’s writ petition (Petition for Writ of Prohibition); the DOJ’s brief (AG Return to Order to Show Cause); and Teran’s reply brief (Teran Reply in Response to Return to OSC).

Oral argument is set for April 2, 2025 at 1:30 p.m.

Court of Appeal unseals news articles wrongly sealed by LA trial court judge.

In a vindication for the public’s right to access court records, the Court of Appeal, on its own motion, issued an order on Nov. 8, 2024 stating  it would unseal some newspaper articles sealed by a Los Angeles Superior Court judge in violation of court sealing rules: “The court advises the parties, pursuant to California Rules of Court, rule 8.46(f)(3), that it proposes to unseal Exhibits D33 and D34 (appendix pages 1141-1188) in this matter that were ordered sealed by the trial court. No adequate legal basis for sealing published news articles appears to exist.”

The Press Freedom Project had asked Los Angeles County Judge Charlaine F. Olmedo to unseal some news articles filed as exhibits, but she rejected our request on July 25, 2024.

Amicus Briefs in the Court of Appeal

The Court of Appeal accepted two amicus briefs and rejected several others.

Accepted:

“The Amended Request for Permission to File Amicus Curiae Brief of Law School Professors in support of petitioner Diana Maria Teran’s petition is granted. The Clerk is ordered to file the amicus brief that was submitted with the Amended Request on February 19, 2025.” See Law Professor Amicus.

“The application by the Office of the District Attorney of Los Angeles County in support of Real Party in Interest is granted. The Clerk is ordered to file the amicus brief that was submitted with the application on February 18, 2025.” See LA District Attorneys Office Amicus.

Denied:

“The application submitted on February 4, 2025, by the Los Angeles County Public Defender for leave to file an amicus curiae brief in support of petitioner Diana Maria Teran is denied.”

“The application submitted on February 18, 2025, by the Civilian Oversight Commission for Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department for leave to file an amicus curiae brief in support of petitioner Diana Maria Teran is denied.” See Civilian Oversight Commission Proposed Amicus

“The application submitted on February 18, 2025, by the ACLU Foundation of Southern California, et al. for leave to file an amici curiae brief in support of petitioner Diana Maria Teran is denied.” See ACLU Proposed Amicus.

“The amended request submitted on February 19, 2025, by the California Public Defender’s Association, et al. for leave to file an amici curiae brief in support of petitioner Diana Maria Teran is denied.” See Calif Pub Defs Assn & Cal Attnys for Crim Justice Proposed Amicus.

“The application submitted on February 19, 2025, by Law Professors Engaged in Civilian Oversight for leave to file an amicus curiae brief in support of petitioner Diana Maria Teran is denied.” See Law Profs Engaged in Civilian Oversight Proposed Amicus.

“The application submitted on February 19, 2025, by Fair and Just Prosecution, et al. for leave to file an amici curiae brief in support of petitioner Diana Maria Teran is denied.”

UC Irvine Law Students Win Release of Records Detailing Payouts to Victims of Law Enforcement Misconduct Over Nearly a Decade

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By IPAT Staff

Students at the UC Irvine School of Law won release of hundreds of documents that will shed light on the county’s payments of millions of dollars to victims who sued the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department and District Attorney’s Office for misconduct over nearly a decade.

“This is a huge win for the public,” said UCI Adjunct Clinical Law Professor Susan E. Seager in an announcement of the settlement today.  Professor Seager supervised the law students who sued the county for the documents and reached a settlement requiring release of the documents.  “For the first time, the public will be able to see a huge database of documents revealing the names of deputies, prosecutors, and investigators who have been sued in court for breaking the law and the county paid the victims millions of dollars.”

“The documents should also provide details on the allegations against the employees and findings by a jury or judge,” Seager said.

The law school clinic informed the court of the settlement in a court filing last week (Dec. 8).

UCI law students worked on the case for over two years on behalf of their client, the non-profit Human Rights Defense Center, publisher of Prison Legal News.  The students sued the county in Los Angeles County Superior Court earlier this year, claiming the county’s refusal to release the documents violated the California Public Records Act.

UCI law student Dane Brody led the school’s litigation team, with support from students Jenna Cowan and Thomasin Bernhardt, negotiating the settlement with the county’s outside lawyers and attending several virtual court hearings with Professor Seager.

“Having the opportunity to represent HRDC and negotiate with the county throughout the semester to obtain a favorable settlement agreement has been one of the most memorable and rewarding experiences during my time at UC Irvine School of Law,” Dane said.  “The work I have done with the clinic has really allowed me to step into the shoes of a practicing attorney, and I look forward to carrying on a robust pro bono practice in my own career in the future.”

The students provided free legal services to the publisher of Prison Legal News, as well as for other independent and non-profit journalist organizations and open government groups, as part of their work in the Press Freedom and Transparency practice in the law school’s Intellectual Property, Arts, and Technology law clinic.

Human Rights Defense Center Executive Director Paul Wright said the settlement will give the public crucial information about these payouts.  “Taxpayers have a right to know what police and jail abuse is costing them in terms of money as well as the human cost,” Wright said. “We hope that making the information publicly available will inform the public on where their tax dollars are going and the need for progressive change in both policing and jail management alike.”

From 2019 to 2021, UC Irvine law students Madeline Knutson, Myles West, Roxanne Markus, Hedyeh Tirgardoon, and Bria Watson sent numerous letters asking the county to voluntarily release the documents under the Public Records Act, conducted negotiations, and performed other work on the case.  After the county repeatedly refused to release the documents, law student Sabrina Victor and Benjamin Whittle drafted the lawsuit and the clinic filed it on April 29, 2021.

The lawsuit, Human Rights Defense Center v. County of Los Angeles, Los Angeles Superior Court Case No. 21STCP01342, alleged that the county violated the state’s Public Records Act by refusing to turn over a decade of its settlement agreements resolving administrative claims and lawsuits against the Sheriff’s Department and District Attorney’s Office.  The lawsuit said that the county was required to turn over copies of the claims, lawsuits, jury verdicts, and court judgments for each settled case under the Public Records Act.  Under the settlement, the county will release nearly all the documents sought by the Human Rights Defense Center, dating from 2013 to present.  The organization had been asking for the records for the past 10 years without success until the law clinic stepped in.

The county told the law students that it would be an “undue burden” for the county to locate all the documents, and that they should go to court and look up the hundreds of lawsuits.  But the lawsuit argued that the public has a right to get copies of the documents already collected by the county.  Seager said that the settlement agreements are not typically filed in court and could only be obtained from the county.

At the first hearing on the case on August 5, 2021, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge James Chalfant told the county that it didn’t have a very strong undue burden defense, and the two sides immediately began settlement talks, Seager said.

Judge Chalfant signed an order last week stating that he will maintain jurisdiction over the case until the county finishes releasing the documents, which is expected to take nine months.

“It’s a shame that we had sue the county to get these documents,” Seager said. “We call on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors to start posting all county settlement agreements and related court documents involving the Sheriff’s Department and DA on a public website to put government transparency into practice.”

The county admitted no wrongdoing, but agreed that the Human Rights Defense Center is the “prevailing party,” which means that the county is required to reimburse the Human Rights Defense Center’s and the UCI law clinic for their attorney’s fees and costs after all the documents are produced.  The amount of the attorney’s fees and costs has not been settled.

Prison Legal News, which is distributed to prisoners across the nation to provide education about prisoners’ legal rights, plans to publish the settlement agreements and related documents online so that the public can have easy access.

The documents will be made publicly available on two Human Rights Defense Center websites: www.prisonlegalnews.org and www.criminallegalnews.org.