TULSA, Okla.— A judge ruled Wednesday that a restraining order on documents involving police misconduct in Tulsa will temporarily remain in place.
A hearing was held at the Tulsa County Courthouse for a restraining order on documents that were under an open records request.
Through that request, a 20-year-long agreement was revealed between the City of Tulsa and the Tulsa Chapter of Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) to destroy records around police misconduct.
The restraining order also revealed the City did not hold up their end of the bargain to some extent.
At this time, both the City and FOP are not answering questions regarding the agreement and are refusing to comment.
It’s unclear if this agreement is legal under state law, how many documents were destroyed or who knew about the agreement, and virtually every other question surrounding this agreement is going unanswered due to the silence of both groups.
FOX23 reported on this story back in May when the application for the restraining order was first filed.
Wednesday’s hearing was set to decide if those documents would be publicly released based on an open records request along with the details of the City’s agreement with FOP.
However, this was put on hold after a second batch of records was revealed to have not been deleted, unbeknownst to the FOP. Judge Caroline Wall, who is presiding over the restraining orders in this case, agreed to a second restraining order for this second batch of records.
This was done to allow the Tulsa FOP time to review the documents before the hearing plays out.
Between the two batches of records, there’s nearly 200 pages of documents around police misconduct that the FOP claims the City of Tulsa agreed to delete.
A Status Conference is set for the parties involved on May 21 at 9:30 a.m.
This conference will allow the parties to decide if they will continue with the hearing on the restraining order or if they’ll lift it entirely to make the documents available to public request.
The City of Tulsa did send FOX23 a document outlining their procedures for the retention and disposal schedule of records.
In that document, it shows cases involving police misconduct are held under “permanent” retention and aren’t to be deleted.
If the City’s agreement with the FOP requires deletion of these types of documents, it would contradict the City’s posted policy unless the records in question only pertain to personal information about officers who have undergone disciplinary action.
Under Oklahoma State Lawthe City can keep those type of records confidential. However, that same statute states any deletion of public records must come from a court order.
If both parties agree to continue to a hearing, another court date will be set and both restraining orders will remain in place until that hearing concludes with a decision to lift the restraining orders.
You can read the City of Tulsa’s full policy for document retention and deletion below:
