public records

A group of legislators are pushing to guarantee the right to access to public records and meetings in the state Constitution, but that proposed amendment likely isn’t headed anywhere during this ye

An effort to exempt autopsy reports from North Carolina's public records law has been abandoned. State Sen. Danny Britt who sponsored the bill says it's more important to win approval for other changes, such as enhanced punishments for people who distribute xylazine when it causes a death.

The bill would explicitly add written autopsy reports to the list of documents exempt from public records when they are part of an investigative file held by prosecutors trying to solve a crime. The written reports could be accessed after a prosecution is complete, one of the bill's proponents said.