The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office last week reiterated its refusal to provide certified records pertaining to the Nizah Morris incident.
PGN is seeking certified copies of dispatch records for a traffic stop initiated by Officer Elizabeth Skala in 2002, around the same time she gave a “courtesy ride” to Morris. Shortly after the ride, the trans woman was found with a fatal head wound. Her homicide remains unsolved.
PGN contends the D.A.’s Office has at least one dispatch record for the traffic stop, which was given to the office by PGN in 2013.
The state Office of Open Records ordered the D.A.’s Office to give a copy of the record to PGN last year, after the agency indicated it’s a complete record for the traffic stop.
The D.A.’s Office complied with OOR’s order, and sent a copy via the U.S. Postal Service in October.
At the time, the paper was requesting complete records for the traffic stop, not a copy of the record it gave to the D.A.’s office, which is missing the incident’s priority level. But now, PGN is seeking a certified copy of the record, along with all other dispatch records for the traffic stop in the D.A.’s possession.
Certification verifies that an agency recognizes the identity of a record that it’s giving to a requester.
In a July 22 submission to the OOR, the D.A.’s Office said it merely returned a record to PGN last year, and doesn’t have to certify it.
The office also said multiple affidavits of non-existence have verified that it doesn’t have other records for the traffic stop.
Additionally, the office termed PGN’s certification request “harassing” and “redundant” in nature.
For its part, PGN argues that the D.A.’s affidavits haven’t been based on “actual knowledge,” otherwise the office wouldn’t have sent PGN any record.
Affidavits of non-existence are required under law to be based on “actual knowledge,” the paper notes.
PGN has requested a public hearing in the dispute, which the D.A.’s Office opposes. But the office hasn’t directly responded to PGN’s alternate offer of participating in mediation.
Babette Josephs, a member of the Justice for Nizah Committee, expressed hope that the D.A.’s Office will be forthcoming about the Morris records in its possession.
“If they don’t have the records, let them deny it in accordance with the law, and we’ll go away,” Josephs said. “But if they’re not going to produce the records and they’re not going to deny they have them as they’re required to do by law, then we need a public hearing. We’re not being unreasonable. If they don’t have the records for whatever reason, poor record-keeping, I don’t know — we’ll accept that fact. We have to. But let them say so, clearly, according to law.”
Charles P. Goodwin, an attorney for PGN, noted the irony of the situation.
“It’s ironic that now that PGN actually seeks a copy of a record it received from the D.A. due to an OOR order, it’s having difficulty getting it,” Goodwin said. “This is just another strange aspect of the Nizah Morris case.”
By presstime, the OOR hadn’t ruled on PGN’s certification request, nor its request for a public hearing.