I'm working on a graduate cognate and central to the work is going to be police records (some of which may have been destroyed about 15 years ago) and an attorney general's report that is hosted on their archives site, but not in full. What is the proper etiquette when attempting to go through these channels to get at information? Do i declare myself as a history graduate student or not? Do i give them any information about why I might need these documents?
Anyone who has dealt with anything like this, please give me a bit of advice.
What levels are the agencies you are trying to contact? If they are below federal (i.e. state or county) then it can vary quite a bit whether or not there is any way you can compel them to cooperate, or even who you should contact. (If they are federal, you use a FOIA request.)
Feel free to PM me with details if you don't want to post them here. I mostly use FOIA but I have interacted with local police departments in the past. Unfortunately they rarely preserve records for very long. As for the AG, are we talking a state or federal AG? That can matter.
As for what you need to tell them either way — if you are making an informal request, then telling them what you are doing might help. If you are making a request under a legal statute (like FOIA), then you only tell them what you are doing with it if it gets you something (i.e. a fee waiver).