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Gov. Code, § 6204.2 · Chapter 3.01. Public Records Protection and Recovery

Gov. Code, § 6204.2

Verbatim from the official edition

Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)

(a) If a local agency has reasonable grounds to believe that a record belonging to that local agency is in the possession of a person, organization, or institution not authorized by law to possess the record, it may request the secretary to act on its behalf pursuant to the procedures specified in Sections 6204 and 6204.1, or undertake on its own behalf the same procedure available to the secretary under those sections, subject to subdivisions (b), (c), and (d).

(b) If a person, organization, or institution that receives a written notice and demand from a local agency issued pursuant to this section does not deliver the described record, does not respond to the notice and demand within the required time, or does not adequately demonstrate that the record does not belong to the local agency, the local agency may request the county district attorney or, where applicable, the city attorney, to petition the superior court in the county in which the record is located for an order requiring the return of the record.

(c) After a hearing, and upon a finding that a specified record is in the possession of a person, organization, or institution not authorized by law to possess the record, the court shall order the record to be delivered to the local agency or a government official designated by the court.

(d) The court may issue any order necessary to protect the record from destruction, alteration, transfer, conveyance, or alienation by the person, organization, or institution in possession of the record, and may order the record to be surrendered into the custody of the local agency pending the court’s decision on the petition. The court may order the record to be available for public access under a request made pursuant to the California Public Records Act (Division 10 (commencing with Section 7920.000)).

Notes and commentary — not statutory text

History

Amended by Stats. 2021, Ch. 615, Sec. 143. (AB 474) Effective January 1, 2022. Operative January 1, 2023, pursuant to Section 463 of Stats. 2021, Ch. 615.

Source of truth

Edition
As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
Official file
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=GOV&sectionNum=6204.2.
Text hash
sha256 a29ab13e1c2770cc149ce582475357db65c5386a3be191c171c9d113884cf887
Composed by
compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section

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Procedural information only. Not legal advice and not a substitute for the advice of an attorney. Confirm the current text with the official publisher before relying on it.