Despite lacking legal authority to do so, localities and agencies around the United States are still pointing to the COVID-19 pandemic as a reason for delaying responses to public records requests, sometimes indefinitely.

In July of 2016, following a series of high-profile police shootings, Black Lives Matter protests erupted in cities all over the country. Some local police departments, ostensibly fearing for the safety of both protestors and officers, reached out to the Federal Bureau of Investigation for help in monitoring upcoming demonstrations. According to documents recently obtained by MuckRock, the FBI provided assistance in the form of social media surveillance and on the ground threat monitoring.

Forty percent of police families deal with domestic violence compared to 25 percent of the general population, and getting out hands on the records that detail these abuses is proving to be expensive. Here’s how you can help.

In 1978, a JFK assassination hoax emerged that continues to fuel conspiracy theories and accusations against the Central Intelligence Agency. Two news stories began to circulate claiming that the House Select Committee on Assassinations had obtained an alleged 1966 CIA memo placing Howard Hunt, of Watergate infamy, in Dallas on the day of President John Kennedy’s assassination. Some conspiracy enthusiasts have tried to use the two articles to corroborate each other, unaware that they shared the same source. A review of over 1,000 pages of documents and testimony gives the story of - and dismantles - the HSCA memo hoax.

Our request for data and policies regarding the collection, maintenance, and testing of backlogged rape kits in Dallas shows that, as of May 2017, more than 1,000 kits still have not been submitted to crime labs. Of those submitted, only 50% have been tested, and just 35% of those tested have been uploaded into CODIS.