PGN submitted appellate papers this week pertaining to its open-records request for 911 recordings relating to the Nizah Morris incident from the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office.
Morris was a trans woman found with a fatal head wound in 2002, shortly after a Center City “courtesy ride” from Philadelphia police. Her homicide remains unsolved.
In November, PGN requested a certified copy of all Morris 911 recordings in the possession of the D.A.’s Office. The matter was in mediation for several months, but mediation was unsuccessful.
Now, the state Office of Open Records must issue a final determination on PGN’s request.
Shortly after the Morris incident, PGN received dozens of 911 recordings from a private citizen that are believed to pertain to the Morris incident. But they’ve never been certified by local authorities.
In 2009, PGN gave a transcript of the recordings to the D.A.’s Office. The office returned a copy of the transcript to PGN in response to the paper’s pending open-records request, but declined to certify any recordings contained in the transcript.
PGN’s Sept. 27 filing contends that the D.A. is required by law to provide a certified copy of all Morris 911 recordings, unless the office has taken reasonable steps and still can’t determine whether it has responsive records.
“[I]f no one at the DAO has actual knowledge as to what was stated over the city’s 911 system during the Morris incident — and the DAO failed to reach out to individuals and/or entities that would reasonably be expected to possess such actual knowledge — then the DAO didn’t act reasonably,” PGN states in the filing.
The filing goes on to note that in 2010, in response to an earlier open-records request by PGN, the D.A.’s Office declined to confirm or deny whether it had Morris 911 recordings.
“The DAO may have declined to provide a certified copy of responsive records [in PGN’s pending request] because the DAO is adhering to its prior policy of refusing to confirm or deny whether it has Morris 911 recordings,” PGN states in the filing. “That would be impermissible because the DAO hasn’t invoked an exemption, privilege or judicial decree in this pending RTKL request.”
Also, the filing states that if the D.A.’s Office has additional Morris 911 recordings not yet given to PGN, it must provide a certified copy of them to the paper.
As of presstime, the D.A.’s Office hadn’t responded to PGN’s filing.
PGN also has an open-records request with the D.A.’s Office for a certified copy of its computer-aided dispatch records pertaining to the Morris case. That request is pending in Commonwealth Court.
In both pending requests, PGN seeks certified copies of all responsive records to ensure that any records provided by the D.A. are done so on the basis of “actual knowledge.”
In 2013, after a 10-year review, the city’s Police Advisory Commission recommended state and federal probes of the Morris case. But no state or federal agency appears to be investigating the case.