Legislation under consideration at the General Assembly would allow for the sealing of criminal complaint affidavits that provide the basis for arrests in Virginia. The bill would allow prosecutors to ask judges to seal such affidavits on a temporary basis for “good cause shown” — though it doesn’t indicate how long “temporary” can be. If it becomes law, the legislation could greatly reduce the information that the public can obtain about crimes in their communities. Given that Virginia’s open records law allows law enforcement agencies to shield even basic police reports from the public, reporters statewide often depend on criminal complaints for information.

In Balzer v. Northeast Illinois Regional Commuter Railroad Corporation, the Illinois Appellate Court addressed when a Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) request sent by email is deemed “received” when a public body’s security software quarantines the message. At issue was an emailed FOIA request to the Northeast Illinois Regional Commuter Railroad Corporation, which operates as Metra, sent on July 31. The email, however, did not reach the FOIA officer on July 31 because Metra’s third‑party email security system, Mimecast, flagged it as suspicious and placed it in quarantine. The FOIA officer learned of the request the next day, on August 1, when Mimecast notified the FOIA officer that a message was being held. After retrieving the request on August 1, the FOIA officer informed the requester that his request was unduly burdensome and asked the requester to narrow his request. The requester declined. The FOIA officer formally denied the request as unduly burdensome on August 8, six business days after the email was sent (though only five business days after the FOIA officer reviewed it after its release from quarantine). The requester sued, arguing Metra’s denial was late under FOIA, that the late response precluded Metra from utilizing the unduly burdensome exemption, and that he was entitled to attorneys’ fees. The Appellate Court held that the request was “received” on July 31, the moment the email was received through Mimecast, despite its subsequent quarantine of the message.

The State Department is removing all posts on its public accounts on the social media platform X made before President Trump returned to office on Jan. 20, 2025. The posts will be internally archived but will no longer be on public view, the State Department confirmed to NPR. Staff members were told that anyone wanting to see older posts will have to file a Freedom of Information Act request, according to a State Department employee who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation by the Trump administration. That would differ from how the U.S. government typically handles archiving the public online footprint of previous administrations.