EPD Chief Watson explains a procedural change regarding booking photos and why it was developed

I contacted Eureka Police Chief Steve Watson because there have been a couple of instances when a booking photo could not be released. It is regarding one of these requests that I heard about a procedural change. Chief

Watson said it is not a written policy but he gave me some insight into why it was developed.

"EPD generally does not release booking photos upon request unless they are associated with an EPD press release or incident where we want or need to get the information out to the public."

"We hope someday soon all EPD booking photos will sync into Citizen Rims and will be available that way. However, right now RIMS pulls photos from other sources too and may inadvertently associate the wrong photo so we have that function turned off until we can fix this issue," said Chief Watson.

· This is for a number of reasons including prioritization of staff time and workload.

· For instance, when our PIO and backup PIO are unavailable or off duty,  our very busy Captains or Sergeants would be the ones to have to review, approve/disapprove, and fulfill the request for a booking photo.  They have more urgent matters to attend to than to provide photos upon request by the media, particularly when it serves no legitimate public safety purpose but rather only the media's purpose such as a “scoop” on a story. 

· Other considerations include that we are not the holder or keeper of the photo record—that is the Humboldt County Jail (HCCF).  HCCF allows agencies access to their booking photos for legitimate and necessary law enforcement purposes.  Again, this is not intended for independent media purposes. 

· While our staff does have some discretion to release a photo upon request on a case by case basis, this generally should be

the exception not the rule.  

· Another issue is our staff’s time and willingness to be helpful has been abused in the past repeatedly, with certain

reporters from some media outlets calling/texting EPD staff after hours and on their days off trying to obtain information/photos about cases that are not urgent and are more for the benefit of the reporter’s story or curiosity versus servicing a legitimate public safety, transparency, or informational purposes.

I understand the media’s position and that time and information matter when it comes to breaking stories.  And we want positive, constructive, two-way relationship with our local media which is where shared understanding, respect, and appropriate boundaries are so important.  

HCCF already posts their “jail reports” online where members of the public and media can easily access them (https://humboldtgov.org/331/Jail-Reports).  I think would be helpful with this issue if the mugshots were also available there for 30 days.