Capt. Paul Chignell: Being Cautious with Info.

Many folks in the Taraval District receive our daily e-mail report, which covers all crimes, arrests and police reports made out by Taraval Station police officers.

The major rationale for this report is to have transparency between police officers and the community they serve, because after all, you pay our salaries.

It is important to know what is happening in your neighborhood, to separate the reality from perception and/or fiction, and for residents who see incidents unfold to be able to find out exactly what happened during a particular incident.

However, by divulging all of this information, some people get frustrated because the police cannot always tell the whole story or give all the information we want due to departmental constraints and, more importantly, legal constraints, such as confidentiality rules.

Some examples include the fact that we cannot give out the names of juvenile offenders and, in fact, give very little information about juvenile crime. Also, the law protects sexual assault victims, juvenile victims and domestic violence victims with strong rules on confidentiality.

Lastly, if a case is ongoing with a criminal investigation, the police can withhold information until the case has been completed.

Giving information to the public under many of the above circumstances is a violation of the law or a violation of our department policy within the framework of the law, as we do not want to jeopardize the safety of victims or release information that may compromise the proper completion of an investigation.

We shall endeavor to provide the public with as much information as we can and strive for transparency, but respect confidentiality.

Capt. Paul Chignell is the commanding officer at the Taraval Police Station.