8, 2020, when Legal Aid submitted a second request specifically for 10 separate items. 'This unconsciously affronts the principles of our republic and our State.' 'Ultimately, its effect is to reallocate wealth from hard working taxpayers to unqualified criminals,' she said. Webb said the effect of the majority's holding will result in more fraudulent claims being paid. 'However, we now abandon that precedent, ignore stare decisis, and leave the public to gamble that disclosure and exemption will be at the whim of the judiciary on any given day,' Webb wrote.

Racop, they specifically found that using publicly available information to determine features about law enforcement operations and investigations fell within an exemption to FOIA disclosure. She said in the case titled Arkansas State Police v. In her dissent, Webb wrote that recently the state's highest court set a precedent that expanded what had been its narrow interpretation of an exception to the Freedom of Information Act as it relates to law enforcement. The circuit court decision was affirmed by the Supreme Court but by a narrow margin, as Supreme Court justices Shawn Womack and Barbara Webb dissented from the opinion. 'While DWS argues that we should employ a common-sense approach to determine that this exception also applies to its fraud factors and algorithms, it is the job of the General Assembly to establish exemptions to the FOIA, and this court can only interpret the exemption as it is written.' 'Applicants for unemployment benefits are not 'competitors' or 'bidders' within the plain language of. 'e agree with the circuit court's refusal to apply this exemption to the information that the Division of Workforce Services is seeking to protect,' Hudson wrote.

Legal Aid argued unemployment claimants are not competing for the same type of work or furnishing materials to the state and that the unambiguous language in the state law does not protect the information being withheld by the Division of Workforce Services. The Division of Workforce Services also stated the redacted records were exempt due to the state law that protects 'files that if disclosed would give advantage to competitors or bidders.' The state agency stated this exemption applies to the fraud factors that it sought to protect from disclosure because bad actors are competing with valid claimants to unlawfully obtain economic benefits from it and other state agencies. 'We agree with Legal Aid that DWS is not a law-enforcement agency, and, on that basis alone, this exemption does not apply,' Courtney Rae Hudson, associate justice of the Supreme Court, wrote in the court's opinion. Legal Aid argued that the law enforcement exemption does not protect the information because the Division of Workforce Services is not a law enforcement agency, there is no open investigation into suspected criminal activity, and the withheld records are not sufficiently investigative to fall within the exemption. The Division of Workforce Services stated in court documents that the exemption applied to the information being sought by Legal Aid because the state agency was participating in an ongoing nationwide effort to combat fraudulent claims related to pandemic-inspired unemployment insurance programs. The agency attempted to use the law enforcement exception or the competitive-advantage exception to combat the Freedom of Information Act request. The Division of Workforce Services argued that the circuit court erred by finding that certain information was not exempt from disclosure. Legal Aid stated in its petition that it had made its FOIA request after hearing from many claimants that they were having trouble accessing their unemployment benefits, and had experienced monthlong delays in processing claims, wrongful denials, unsubstantiated allegations of fraud or overpaid benefits and lack of information about applicant procedures. 13, 2020, Legal Aid submitted a request to the state's Division of Workforce Services seeking information about how the agency and its third party vendors determined eligibility for applicants of the Unemployment Insurance and/or Pandemic Unemployment Assistance Programs. The state's highest court affirmed Thursday a Pulaski County Circuit Court decision that requires the Division of Workforce Services to produce the unredacted information requested by Legal Aid, a nonprofit, public interest law firm. The Arkansas Supreme Court upheld a circuit court order requiring the state's Division of Workforce Services to produce unredacted documents after it was determined the state agency couldn't apply for a law enforcement exemption to a Freedom of Information Act request.

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