Court: NY Times's Request for New York City Gun Owners Violates Law

A New York appellate court has ruled that the New York Times's request for a list of gun owners in New York City, under the Freedom of Information Law, violates the state's statute. The ruling overturns in part a lower court's ruling.

"Order and judgment (one paper), Supreme Court, New York County (Jane S. Solomon, J.), entered November 1, 2011, granting the petition to the extent it sought an order directing respondent, under the Freedom of Information Law (Public Officers Law § 84 et seq.) (FOIL), to provide an electronic copy of a database, as redacted, of names and addresses of New York City residents who have been granted handgun licenses, and a database, to be redacted, of hate crimes reported to respondent from January 1, 2005 to the present, and denying the petition to the extent it sought an order directing respondent to provide an electronic copy of its crime incident database, a declaration that respondent's practices in responding to FOIL requests violate the statute, and an order directing respondent to cease these practices, unanimously modified, on the law, to deny the petition as to the databases of handgun licensees and hate crimes and to reinstate the petition with respect to the demand for the crime incident database, insofar as it seeks production of the electronic crime incident database produced in Floyd v City of New York (08 Civ 01034 [SAS] [US Dist Ct, SD NY]) (the Floyd database), and the matter remitted to Supreme Court for a determination of whether production of the Floyd database should be ordered, and, if so, to what extent and under what conditions, and otherwise affirmed, without costs," reads the ruling.

"The court correctly declined to declare that respondent's responses to FOIL requests and rulings on administrative appeals are as a matter of practice untimely and to order respondent to cease this practice. The FOIL requester's statutory remedy for an untimely response or ruling is to deem the response a denial and commence a CPLR article 78 proceeding "for review of such denial" (Public Officers Law § 89[4][a],[b]; Matter of Miller v New York State Dept. of Transp., 58 AD3d 981, 983 [3d Dept 2009], lv denied 12 NY3d 712 [2009]). Review of a FOIL determination does not provide for mandamus relief (see Matter of Harvey v Hynes, 174 Misc 2d 174, 177 [Sup Ct, Kings County 1997])."