Because of a 2023 law that protects the privacy of juveniles, the Colorado Judicial Department plans to limit attorneys’ access to criminal court records and clerks may take longer to process document requests from journalists and the public.
Senate Bill 23-075 requires the deletion of names and identifying information of child victims and witnesses from criminal justice records before they are released, but the courts “do not have any way of identifying affected records without word-for-word review of each document to flag and redact the newly protected information,” says a recent judicial branch memo.
“The Department must therefore secure all pertinent criminal records in” the Colorado courts e-filing system, starting Jan. 1, 2024, it adds.