The Washington State Patrol admitted to losing an unknown amount of emails and public records after a data migration failure last year led to the permanent deletion of those documents.
Internal communications reviewed by Cascade PBS warned that “hundreds of thousands” of emails were potentially missing, but Chris Loftis, the patrol’s communications director, told the news outlet in an email that “the specific extent of unrecoverable emails is yet to be fully realized” as the agency has “no accurate inventory or method to calculate the total number.” Loftis stressed that the initial speculation of hundreds of thousands of missing documents is now determined to be excessive.
The issue became known to State Patrol staff in mid-2023, and internal emails show the issue was first noticed when folders for certain lawsuits, which should have contained emails, legal filings and attachments, were found to be empty. Emails regarding audits, policy changes, accreditations and claims are also missing, as are certain vaccine mandate emails.
“Importantly, we do not foresee impacts on active or past investigations and criminal records as any email would be replicated and recorded separately as part of a case file,” Loftis added. “Thus, at this point, we see this as a procedural and administrative challenge and not a challenge to our core responsibilities in law enforcement.”
Internal communications at the State Patrol showed concerns that the records management department would be “hampered in civil legal defense for years to come” as a result of the missing documents.
“Not only will we be blind to information we need and surprised in litigation, we may need to duplicate huge volumes of work,” the email read.
Loftis said the agency continues to “monitor the situation to mitigate potential challenges related to the unrecoverable emails,” but that so far they have not seen any “material impacts” and “are hopeful that trend continues.”
Asked if the agency had notified the governor’s or attorney general’s offices of the missing documents, Loftis confirmed that both offices were notified after Cascade PBS began inquiring about the issue, but he was “not sure what other communications may or may not have transpired” since 2023.