Judge Miller Orders Idaho Police Records Released

An Ada County judge on Nov. 5 ordered the Idaho State Police and Idaho Department of Correction to release employment information for officers, ruling that the agencies had improperly withheld public records sought by InvestigateWest and the Invisible Institute.

District Judge Patrick J. Miller directed the agencies to provide officers’ employment dates and their reasons for leaving state service. The order includes records involving two former prison guards accused of sexually assaulting an inmate.

Records dispute

InvestigateWest and the Invisible Institute filed suit against the agencies June 16 after updated requests for employment records were denied. The agencies also said they would no longer disclose whether officers had retired, resigned or been fired.

Miller ruled that an employee’s termination, resignation or retirement is public information. He also found that identifying the reason for a separation does not disclose the underlying details of an employee’s departure.

“The Idaho Public Records Act does not categorically shield every piece of information contained within an otherwise exempt file,” Miller wrote.

The judge also ordered both agencies to conduct new searches for requested database records and to disclose the names of several state employees accused of misconduct whose identities had been redacted.

Database records

Idaho State Police said its reporting tool was unreliable and could return different results for identical searches. A records clerk said agency leadership had decided to disable an internal employment-database search tool.

Miller ruled that taking a retrieval tool offline does not erase the underlying records or make the information nonexistent for public-records purposes.

InvestigateWest had used officer employment records in an October 2025 series concerning alleged sexual misconduct by Idaho prison guards. After that reporting, Idaho lawmakers removed a loophole in a sexual-abuse law and ordered an independent review of how the women’s prison system handled sexual-abuse reports.

Jacob Fries, InvestigateWest’s executive director, called the decision “a win for government transparency – and accountability – in Idaho.” The National Freedom of Information Coalition, Society of Professional Journalists and Idaho Press Club supported the litigation.