Klein v. Iowa Public Information Board
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The Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part the decision of the district court dismissing Appellants' petition for judicial review of the decision of the Iowa Public Information Board declining to order the disclosure of any records that had not previously been disclosed, holding that the district court erred in part.
The open records requests at issue in this case stemmed from a 2015 incident in which a police officer responding to a 911 call about a domestic assault accidentally shot and killed one of the participants. The incident led to a civil lawsuit and also prompted the records requests. The family's attorney filed a complaint under the Iowa Public Information Board Act, but the Board declined to order disclosure of the requested records. The district court dismissed the family's attorney's petition for judicial review based on lack of standing and failure to exhaust administrative remedies. The Supreme Court held (1) the family's attorney exhausted administrative remedies by filing with complaint with the Board, but on judicial review, the attorney may only pursue open records requests that were actually raised before the Board and decided by it; and (2) the family's attorney did not have standing to seek the production of records that are now publicly available.
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