AMERICAN FORK -- Former City Councilman George E. Brown Jr. has scored a small victory in his battle with city leaders and police over enforcement of city policy.
A 4th District judge ruled last week that the city must release some of the documents Brown has been seeking for the past two years. During a half-day trial April 3, Brown was also able to get in evidence that police officers likely violated city policy by faxing documents to their private attorney with city equipment and on city phone lines.However, Judge Gary D. Stott ruled most of the documents sought by Brown will remain confidential. The judge also refused to allow Brown to use the trial as a forum to support his claims that city leaders abuse policies and are inconsistent in handling requests for records.
"The laws of the state of Utah in American Fork City are selectively enforced," Brown argued in trying to get evidence admitted relating to his allegations of wrongdoing.
But Stott only allowed Brown to present evidence specific to 11 documents he was seeking that the city had classified as private. The documents pertain to a run-in Brown had with police at a City Council meeting in June 1997. The judge said he only wanted to hear evidence on why the documents should or should not be made public.
Most of the city officials and employees that Brown subpoenaed for the trial were never called to the witness stand and spent most of the day waiting in the courthouse lobby. The testimony Brown sought from them related to his claims of wrongdoing and had nothing to do with the documents in question.
"I don't need to concern myself with them for the purposes of the hearing today," Stott said.
Brown petitioned the court for release of the documents in November 1998 after his request for the records was denied by the city and the Utah Records Committee.
The day after the trial, Stott ruled six documents sought by Brown are protected under attorney-client privilege. The documents are letters from city prosecutor Tucker Hansen to outside counsel hired by the city and notes handwritten by conflict counsel Kim Buhler.
The judge ordered the release, however, of a letter from Hansen to the Utah Attorney General's Office, a letter from the the state office to Hansen and a letter from Utah County Attorney Kay Bryson to Hansen. Stott ruled the letters do not have attorney-client privilege because the county attorney and state attorney were not representing the city. Hansen simply sought legal opinions from the two prosecuting agencies on the case involving Brown.
Following that 1997 run-in with police at City Hall, Brown was charged with disorderly conduct. He later pleaded not guilty to the infraction, and the case was held in abeyance for one year and the charge eventually dismissed.
Although most of the evidence Brown hoped to introduce at the trial was not allowed, he did introduce evidence that police officers who are suing city leaders faxed documents from the police department to their private attorney. The evidence came out while Brown questioned former police chief John Durrant.
Stott allowed the questioning because Brown said he believed the documents he was seeking were among those faxed to the officers' attorney. But the judge cut off the testimony when nothing came out supporting that claim and when City Attorney Kevin Bennett again argued that Brown was introducing evidence on extraneous issues.
Brown said officers should have been disciplined for violating city policy and should have been prosecuted for releasing protected records. Since the information was being used for private matters and non-city business, the officers should have been required like other citizens to request the documents under the Government Records and Access Management Act, he said.
Stott denied a request by Brown for the city to pay him more than $4,000 in attorneys fees. The judge ruled even though Brown is an attorney, that he represented himself as a resident of American Fork. However, the city will have to pay Brown about $240 in witness fees and other expenses he incurred in seeking the records.