OPINION OF THE COURT
In this CPLR article 78 proceeding, petitioner, a newspaper publishing company, seeks a judgment directing respondent Office of Court Administration (OCA) to produce computer records sought in a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request of OCA’s CRIMS (Criminal Records Information Management System) data base, which electronically stores data extracted from criminal court case records.
Facts
On June 5, 2000, petitioner made a FOIL request to obtain the CRIMS electronic data base. It appears that petitioner was operating a commercial venture selling electronic records, and that it planned to resell the CRIMS data base for profit, over the Internet, at per transaction prices substantially below those charged by OCA. By letter dated June 15, 2000, OCA denied petitioner’s request on the ground that the CRIMS data base consisted of court records and that FOIL does not apply to court records. Petitioner administratively appealed the denial; by letter dated June 28, 2000, OCA denied the appeal.
Public access to the subject records is not at issue here. Both parties apparently sell or intend to sell such data. At issue is whether those records are obtainable via FOIL and whether respondent improperly denied petitioner’s FOIL request.
New York’s Freedom of Information Law was adopted in 1977. (Public Officers Law § 84 et seq., added by L 1977, ch 933, § 1.) Public Officers Law § 86 (3) excludes “the judiciary” from its definition of an “agency” subject to FOIL. Section 86 (1) defines the “judiciary” as “the courts of the state, including any municipal or district court, whether or not of record.” This all-embracing definition is synonymous with the constitutional definition of the “unified court system.” (NY Const, art VI, § 1 [a].) OCA is the central administrative office of New York’s courts (the “unified court system”). (Judiciary Law § 212 [1] [b].) It is neither an independent agency nor a separate entity. Established by the Chief Administrative Judge, OCA has no distinct existence apart from the courts.
OCA is not itself a court, but rather the courts’ own support office. While two cases have held that OCA is an “agency” that falls within the coverage of Public Officers Law § 86 (1) (see, Babigian v Evans,
Merely because the records sought consist of data derived from criminal case records transferred from paper to electronic files do not make this data any less a court record for purposes of FOIL. In Matter of Newsday v Sise (
Matter of Williams v Erie County Dist. Attorney (
The cases cited by petitioner did not address the exclusion from FOIL of court records under Public Officers Law § 86. The courts have consistently held that court records are not subject to disclosure under FOIL, even if those court records are possessed by other agencies. (See, Matter of Mullgrav v Santucci,
Unless otherwise statutorily disclosable or available to the public (see, part II, infra), court records are privileged. The judiciary, and only the judiciary, has the power to determine when, and under what conditions, they may be made available.
As a court record, the CRIMS data base is exempt from FOIL pursuant to the exclusion of Public Officers Law § 86 (3).
II
State Finance Law § 94-b (L 1992, ch 55, § 412) establishes a special revenue fund called the Judiciary Data Processing Offset Fund. (State Finance Law § 94-b [1].) The Legislature
Adopted 15 years after FOIL, State Finance Law § 94-b evinces a legislative intent that FOIL not apply to records covered by that section. This statute clearly envisions that OCA would sell criminal histories and other electronically kept court data, because, without such sales, there would be no corpus for such an offset fund. It assumes that the courts, through OCA, have the authority to sell that data and collect the proceeds to defray OCA’s data processing function. (See, State Finance Law § 94-b [4].) Similarly, the Legislature would not have enacted State Finance Law § 94-b if it intended for the data to be subject to FOIL.
Conclusion
Petitioner has not met its burden of demonstrating that respondent acted arbitrarily, capriciously or contrary to law by denying petitioner’s FOIL request for the CRIMS data base.
Accordingly, it is ordered and adjudged that the petition is denied and the proceeding is dismissed.
Notes
. On October 17, 2000, after submission of this proceeding, the Executive Director of the New York State Committee on Open Government issued an advisory opinion which concludes that the CRIMS data base constitutes court records not subject to FOIL. On consent, after a conference call, the court afforded both sides the opportunity to submit additional papers relating to the advisory opinion, by November 3, 2000. While not controlling, formal opinions of the Committee on Open Government are viewed as authoritative in interpreting FOIL. (See, Kwasnik v City of New York,
. State Finance Law § 94-b technically does not constitute a repeal by implication (see, McKinney’s Cons Laws of NY, Book 1, Statutes § 397) because the Legislature never intended that FOIL provide access to court records. Rather, it is compelling evidence of continued legislative intent that FOIL is inapplicable to the records sought.