FRANKFORT - The Elsmere Police Department is obligated to do more than tell someone its computer system is inoperative in response to a request for records, the attorney general's office said.

        Chris Henson asked the police department for all offense reports for a certain individual and all police calls to a certain address.

        Robert Carran, the city attorney, said he told Mr. Henson that the police department's computer was “down.” Mr. Carran later told the attorney general's office that a virus had destroyed the records on the department's computer.

        “The fact that its computer system was down at the time of Henson's request and that he knew this did not relieve the department of its statutory duty,” Assistant Attorney General Amye Bensenhaver said in an opinion released Monday.

        Ms. Bensenhaver noted that most offense reports are initially handwritten and police calls are ordinarily recorded on audiotape from dispatch centers. The department is required to search those records to respond to the request.

        Further, Ms. Bensenhaver said Elsmere police are required to notify the state Department of Libraries and Archives if its records were destroyed. Both police incident reports and audiotapes of police dispatches are considered vital records, Ms. Bensenhaver said.

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