Case Summary

P1367 REVIEW DENIED A memo contained in the personnel file of an officer who was not connected to any of the issues in the case and did not contain personal information about the officer in whose file it was kept or any of the information specifically listed in the definition of police personnel records in Penal Code section 832.8 was admissible although it was not obtained by way of a Pitchess motion; testimony by a witness that he had been told by others that plaintiff was demoted because of her gender was inadmissible hearsay, but its admission was harmless error, because a great deal of other admissible evidence made the same point; exit questionnaires filled out by officers leaving a police department to join another department were not records kept in the regular course of the business of the persons who filled them out; summaries of the questionnaires created by employees of the department that sought to admit them were not admissible as records kept in the regular course of the department's business, because the circumstances did not indicate they were trustworthy since the officers who filled them out might have feared that statements made in the questionnaires would cause them problems in their new job.

ZANONE v CITY WHITTIER (No Pitchess) 162 CA4 174 [See: PenC 832.8; EvC 1271; Haggerty v Superior Court 117 CA4 1079, P/AT 5/04; Pitchess v Superior Court 11 C3 531]