Hey, Sheriff Fletcher—I've got a question

Three emails, five voice mails and 23 days later, I finally heard back from the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office about our Data Practices Act request.

As for the 33 terrorist groups the department investigated in 2009, according to its own report?

They don't have anything on file about that, Public Information Officer Holli Drinkwine said.

"I don't think we have any of the terrorism briefs," Drinkwine said Friday, November 12. "I think that's what (our department) gets from the feds. I think they put those things together."

The "feds," Drinkwine explained, are the Minneapolis Joint Terrorism Task Force, of which the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office is a partner.

Drinkwine said "three or four" other journalists have already approached her for this same information; as in our case, she referred them to the JTTF.

Part of Sheriff's annual report

"I think you're going to get better answers out of them," she said.

But why? Even if the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office didn't write the briefs, as Drinkwine maintains, wouldn't they at least keep copies of them?

"We don't create them," she said. "If we didn't generate them, we don't keep them."

I told Drinkwine it seemed her department should have these records, and that the Twin Cities Daily Planet and I are committed to following through with this process until we get them.

She said she'd look into it again -- but that I shouldn't expect to hear from her next week. Drinkwine lost her job when Sheriff Bob Fletcher lost the election, and she has to use up her accrued vacation and personal time, she said.

I'm interested in hearing what Drinkwine will say when she's back to work on Monday, Nov. 22.

Karen Hollish

Karen Hollish is a writer, editor and photographer who left Minneapolis but hopes to return.