morf13 wrote:I am still shocked that they released info including this guy's name not knowing if he was dead. They usually do not release info about persons that are alive and you need to send them proof of death. I too think it's odd that the kid picked a guy in the military from southern CA- would like to know the circumstances sorrounding that. Still, good job Welsh getting this, it's something to work with.
I know that if you request info on a person you have the name and details for, then yes, the onus is on you to supply proof of death. However, if your request is for the release of a suspect or person not known to you and is a suspect featured in a redacted document, then it is not plausible, nor possible, to be expected to supply proof of death because the very nature of the FOIA requests is to obtain his name. If you don't know who he is, how can you prove he's dead? I can only assume that there are exemptions to the need for proof of death, and one of those is requesting the release of a suspect that cannot be known to the requesting party due to their own Dpt. not making it available. I would hazard a guess that in these circumstances, the onus is on them to seek and find proof of death because it is not possible for you as the requesting party to do so due to their own redacted document.
As I said, I knew that FOIA requests for documents relating to specific people require you to prove they are deceased and therefore the Privacy Laws can be waived, so I stated in the request that due to the very nature of the request being the release of a person name and details, (because I don't know who he is and requesting they tell me), it's therefore not plausible, nor even possible, for me to supply evidence of death. I didn't think the request would be successful not because of that issue, but because he was never officially charged or named as POI/Suspect by LE, Media etc.