SF Chronicle reporter's FOIA request dates to 1981

Sunday, March 13, 2005 · Last updated 9:20 a.m. PT

Reporter's FOIA request dates to 1981

By MARTHA MENDOZA
AP NATIONAL WRITER

SAN FRANCISCO -- Twenty-four years after a young and optimistic journalist-in-the-making typed up a Freedom of Information Act request to the FBI, Seth Rosenfeld - now an award-winning muckraker with a few gray hairs - is still waiting for the records.

"I'm very disappointed that the Justice Department and the FBI have failed to comply with the law, with court orders and with their own legal agreement to release these public records," Rosenfeld says.

An investigative and legal affairs reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, Rosenfeld holds the dubious record of "longest pending FOIA request," according to the National Security Archive, a nonprofit research center on declassified documents.

When he made his request, Rosenfeld was researching Cold War FBI activities at the University of California. Well, actually, he's still researching it.

more...
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Sunshine%20Week%20Oldest%20FOIA

Wow!

... release a couple of years ago, I think. Big story then about Reagan's illegal use of the FBI to ruin Clark Kerr. The bulk of his stories on UC are here:

http://sfgate.com/news/special/pages/2002/campusfiles/

A lot of it is very unfavorable to Reagan, and to Hoover, and I suspect that is the only reason why Rosenfeld's not been able to obtain a complete release of documents.