SUMMARY

November 2, 2023

2023COA101

No. 21CA1608, Colorado Sun v. Brubaker — Public Records —

Colorado Open Records Act; Children’s Code — Dependency 

and Neglect Records and Information — Reports of Child Abuse 

or Neglect — Identifying Information

In this case brought under the Colorado Open Records Act, 

§§ 24-70-201 to -230, C.R.S. 2023, several media organizations 

sought records showing the total number of child abuse reports 

received over a three-year period from certain residential care 

facilities. The records custodian for the Colorado Department of 

Human Services (DHS) denied the requests, citing a provision of the 

Children’s Code that prohibits disclosure of child abuse reports as 

well as “the name and address of any child, family, or informant or 

any other identifying information contained in such reports.” § 19-

1-307(1)(a), C.R.S. 2023. According to DHS, disclosure of the 

requested aggregated information would necessarily reveal the 

The summaries of the Colorado Court of Appeals published opinions 

constitute no part of the opinion of the division but have been prepared by 

the division for the convenience of the reader. The summaries may not be 

cited or relied upon as they are not the official language of the division. 

Any discrepancy between the language in the summary and in the opinion 

should be resolved in favor of the language in the opinion.
address of a child or informant contained in a child abuse report 

because the requests were linked to specific addresses — the 

addresses of the residential care facilities. 

The question on appeal is whether section 19-1-307(1)(a) 

prohibits, under all circumstances, the disclosure of any address 

contained in a child abuse report or whether the statute prohibits 

disclosure of an address only when the address constitutes 

“identifying information”— that is, information that could lead to 

the identification of a particular child, family, or informant. After 

considering the statutory language, the legislative history, and the 

consequences of adopting either party’s construction, the majority 

concludes that the statute prohibits the disclosure of an address 

only if it constitutes identifying information. Accordingly, the 

division reverses the judgment and remands the case to the district 

court for a determination of whether the address in this case 

constitutes identifying information.

The dissent concludes that under the plain language of section 

19-1-307(1)(a), the address of a child, family, or informant 

contained in a child abuse report is always confidential and can 

never be disclosed.
COLORADO COURT OF APPEALS 2023COA101

Court of Appeals No. 21CA1608

City and County of Denver District Court No. 21CV31379

Honorable Darryl F. Shockley, Judge

Colorado Sun and Tegna, Inc., d/b/a KUSA-TV/9News,

Plaintiffs-Appellants,

v.

Amanda Brubaker, in her official capacity as the Records Custodian for the 

Colorado Department of Human Services,

Defendant-Appellee.

JUDGMENT REVERSED AND CASE 

REMANDED WITH DIRECTIONS

Division VII

Opinion by JUDGE HARRIS

Gomez, J., concurs

Pawar, J., dissents

Announced November 2, 2023

Law Office of Steven D. Zansberg, LLC, Steven D. Zansberg, Denver, Colorado, 

for Plaintiffs-Appellants

Philip J. Weiser, Attorney General, Ann H. Pogue, Second Assistant Attorney 

General, Bianca E. Miyata, Assistant Solicitor General, Denver, Colorado, for 

Defendant-Appellee
1

¶ 1 This case involves a dispute under the Colorado Open Records 

Act (CORA), §§ 24-70-201 to -230, C.R.S. 2023. Plaintiffs, Colorado 

Sun and Tegna, Inc., d/b/a KUSA-TV/9News (the media 

organizations), requested records under CORA from defendant, 

Amanda Brubaker, the records custodian for the Colorado 

Department of Human Services (DHS),1 showing the total number of 

child abuse reports received over a three-year period from certain 

residential child care facilities in Colorado. DHS denied the 

requests, citing a provision of the Colorado Children’s Code that 

prohibits disclosure, subject to statutorily enumerated exceptions,

of child abuse reports as well as “the name and address of any 

child, family, or informant or any other identifying information 

contained in such reports.” § 19-1-307(1)(a), C.R.S. 2023. 

According to DHS, disclosure of the aggregated information would 

necessarily reveal the address of a child or informant contained in a 

child abuse report, as the requests were linked to specific addresses 

— the address of each residential care facility. 

1 For simplicity’s sake, we refer to the defendant as the Department 

of Human Services (DHS), not Amanda Brubaker, as Brubaker was 

acting on behalf of DHS.
2

¶ 2 On judicial review of DHS’s denial, the district court entered 

judgment in favor of DHS, and the media organizations appeal.

¶ 3 The question is whether section 19-1-307(1)(a) prohibits, 

under all circumstances, the disclosure of any address contained in 

a child abuse report or whether the statute prohibits disclosure of 

an address only when the address constitutes “identifying 

information” — that is, information that could lead to the 

identification of a particular child, family, or informant.

¶ 4 We conclude that the statute is ambiguous. To break the 

impasse, we turn to the legislative history of section 19-1-307(1)(a)

and the possible consequences of adopting either construction. In 

our view, the evolution of the statutory provision at issue 

demonstrates that the General Assembly intended to keep 

confidential only information that could reveal a person’s or family’s 

identity, and the possible consequences of adopting either 

interpretation reinforce this conclusion. We therefore adopt the 

media organizations’ interpretation of the statute.

¶ 5 As a result, we reverse the district court’s judgment and 

remand the case for further proceedings. 
3

I. Factual Background2

¶ 6 Residential child care facilities (RCCFs) are licensed by DHS to 

“provide twenty-four-hour group care and treatment” for children, 

§ 26-6-903(29), C.R.S. 2023, most of whom have “serious 

emotional, behavioral and/or developmental disorders,” Off. of 

Colo.’s Child Prot. Ombudsman (CPO), Investigation Report: CPO 

Case ID 2017-2736, at 3 (Aug. 12, 2019), https://perma.cc/8RSSRDKE (CPO Report).

¶ 7 In 2017, DHS revoked the license of an RCCF in Pueblo amidst 

allegations that staff members had abused and neglected the child 

residents. Id. The CPO investigated the circumstances 

surrounding the facility’s closure and issued the CPO Report. The 

CPO Report documented the total number of child abuse and 

neglect reports received by the county human services department 

in the year preceding the closure, as well as the number and 

percentage of reports “screened out” by the county (i.e., reports that 

2 In recounting the background, we, like the district court, accept 

all factual allegations in the complaint as true and may consider, 

along with the complaint, any documents attached to it or 

incorporated by reference. See Denver Post Corp. v. Ritter, 255 P.3d 

1083, 1088 (Colo. 2011). 
4

are not assigned to a caseworker for further assessment). Id. at 10-

11. 

¶ 8 In March 2021, while DHS was allegedly scrutinizing its 

practices, a second RCCF closed. The CPO disclosed the number of 

complaints received by county human services officials about the 

RCCF in the preceding year. 

¶ 9 Shortly thereafter, the media organizations sent the following 

requests to DHS for records concerning other RCCFs: 

• “[A]ny documents that show how many calls have been 

made to the child abuse hotline3 from Mount Saint 

Vincent (RCCF) and Cleo Wallace (RCCF) from 

1/1/2018 to 3/26/2021.”

• “The number of hotline calls/abuse and neglect 

reports/runaways reports from Tennyson Center, 

Mount St. Vincent, and Cleo Wallace to local child 

welfare authorities in the last three years, and how 

many were screened in.”

3 Reports of suspected child abuse or neglect may be made directly 

to the county department of human services or local law 

enforcement or through the child abuse reporting hotline system. 

See §§ 19-3-307(1), 26-5-111, C.R.S. 2023. 
5

DHS denied the requests “pursuant to CRS 19-1-307(1)(a).” It 

explained that the responsive records would effectively disclose the 

address “of the child or informant associated with the hotline calls.” 

Instead, DHS offered to provide the media organizations with the 

aggregated number of child abuse hotline calls, including the 

number that were “screened in” (i.e., reports that were referred to a 

caseworker for further assessment), from all three RCCFs during 

the relevant period. 

¶ 10 The media organizations sued DHS pursuant to section 24-72-

204(5), C.R.S. 2023, seeking an order compelling it to produce the 

requested records. DHS moved to dismiss the complaint on the 

ground that an address is identifying information that must be kept 

confidential. The district court granted the motion, concluding that 

“the Defendant has properly withheld [the requested] information.” 

II. Statutory Background

A. CORA

¶ 11 “With the passage of CORA, the General Assembly declared it 

to be the public policy of Colorado that ‘all public records shall be 

open for inspection by any person, at reasonable times,’ except as 

otherwise provided by law.” Denver Post Corp. v. Ritter, 255 P.3d 
6

1083, 1089 (Colo. 2011) (quoting § 24-72-201, C.R.S. 2023). 

“Public records” are “all writings made, maintained, or kept by the 

state [or] any agency . . . for use in the exercise of functions 

required or authorized by law or administrative rule or involving the 

receipt or expenditure of public funds.” § 24-72-202(6)(a)(I), C.R.S. 

2023. 

¶ 12 DHS does not dispute that child abuse reports are “public 

records.” See § 19-1-302(1)(a), C.R.S. 2023 (“The general assembly 

declares that information obtained by public agencies in the course 

of performing their duties under this title [of the Children’s Code] is 

considered public information under [CORA].”). Still, while the 

general purpose of CORA is to provide open government through 

disclosure of public records, its purpose is not to disclose 

information that falls under an exception in the statute. See 

Mountain-Plains Inv. Corp. v. Parker Jordan Metro. Dist., 2013 COA 

123, ¶ 35. In light of the strong presumption in favor of disclosure, 

exceptions to disclosure are narrowly construed, and the record 

custodian bears the burden to prove that an exception applies. See 

Shook v. Pitkin Cnty. Bd. of Cnty. Comm’rs, 2015 COA 84, ¶ 6. 
7

¶ 13 One exception to the rule requiring disclosure is where 

“inspection would be contrary to any state statute.” § 24-72-

204(1)(a). DHS relied on this exception in denying the media 

organizations’ requests, contending that section 19-1-307(1)(a)

prohibited disclosure of the requested information.

B. Section 19-1-307(1)(a)

¶ 14 Section 19-1-307(1)(a) provides as follows:

Identifying information — confidential. Except 

as otherwise provided in this section and 

section 19-1-303, reports of child abuse or 

neglect and the name and address of any 

child, family, or informant or any other 

identifying information contained in such 

reports shall be confidential and shall not be 

public information.

¶ 15 The earliest iteration of the statute was enacted as part of the 

Colorado Child Protection Act of 1975 (the 1975 Act) and broadly 

prohibited disclosure of information in child abuse reports: 

Records confidential. (1) It is unlawful for any 

person or agency to solicit, encourage 

disclosure of, or disclose the contents of any 

record or report made under this article.

Ch. 177, sec. 1, § 19-10-115, 1975 Colo. Sess. Laws 654.

¶ 16 Shortly after passage of the 1975 Act, a lawsuit by journalists 

required a district court to determine whether the strict 
8

confidentiality imposed by the statute ran afoul of Colorado’s Public 

Meetings Law (PML), section 29-9-101, C.R.S. 1975 (repealed 1991). 

See Gillies v. Schmidt, 38 Colo. App. 233, 234-35, 556 P.2d 82, 84 

(1976).

¶ 17 The district court determined that the PML and the records 

statute could be harmonized by distinguishing “between 

information which could lead to identification of the child, parents 

or informant” and “information in the reports which is 

‘nonconfidential.’” Id. at 237, 556 P.2d at 86. Nonconfidential 

information could be discussed at public meetings, the district 

court ruled, while “identifying information” could only be discussed 

in nonpublic executive sessions. Id. 

¶ 18 A division of the court of appeals rejected the district court’s 

reasoning. It concluded that the statute prohibited disclosure of 

the “entire contents” of a child abuse report and, therefore, the 

distinction between identifying information and nonconfidential 

information had no statutory basis. Id. 

¶ 19 Within a year, the legislature amended the statute. The new 

act (the 1977 Act) included an amended legislative declaration (with 

the amended language marked in capital letters): 
9

Legislative declaration. The general assembly 

hereby declares that the complete reporting of 

child abuse is a matter of public concern and 

that in enacting this article it is the intent of 

the general assembly to protect the best 

interests of children of this state and to offer 

protective services in order to prevent any 

further harm to a child suffering from abuse. 

IT IS ALSO THE INTENT OF THE GENERAL 

ASSEMBLY THAT CHILD PROTECTION 

TEAMS PUBLICLY DISCUSS PUBLIC 

AGENCIES’ RESPONSES TO CHILD-ABUSE 

AND NEGLECT REPORTS SO THAT THE 

PUBLIC AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY MAY 

BE BETTER INFORMED CONCERNING THE 

OPERATION AND ADMINISTRATION OF THIS 

ARTICLE.

Ch. 246, sec. 1, § 19-10-102, 1977 Colo. Sess. Laws 1020.

¶ 20 The 1977 Act also included an amended records provision. 

Section 19-10-115 (the predecessor to section 19-1-307(1)(a)) had 

previously prohibited disclosure, subject to certain exceptions, of 

any information in child abuse reports; now it generally prohibited 

disclosure of “reports of child abuse or neglect and the name and 

address of any child, family, or informant or any other identifying 

information contained in such reports,” id. at sec. 8, § 19-10-115, 

1977 Colo. Sess. Laws at 1023 — the current language of section 

19-1-307(a)(1). 
10

III. Motion to Dismiss

¶ 21 The media organizations contend that the district court erred 

by dismissing their complaint. They say that section 19-1-307(1)(a) 

does not prohibit DHS from producing the requested records 

because they would not reveal “identifying information.”

A. Standard of Review

¶ 22 We review de novo whether the district court properly 

dismissed a complaint for failure to state a claim. See Nieto v. 

Clark’s Mkt., Inc., 2021 CO 48, ¶ 11. 

¶ 23 Questions of statutory interpretation are also subject to de 

novo review. See id. at ¶ 12. In interpreting a statute, our primary 

goal is to ascertain and give effect to the General Assembly’s intent. 

See Elder v. Williams, 2020 CO 88, ¶ 18. To accomplish this, we 

look first to the statute’s plain language, reading words and phrases 

in context and construing them according to rules of grammar and 

common usage. Broomfield Senior Living Owner, LLC v. R.G. 

Brinkmann Co., 2017 COA 31, ¶ 17. If the meaning of the statute is 

clear from the language alone, our analysis is complete, and we 

apply the statute as written. See OXY USA Inc. v. Mesa Cnty. Bd. of

Comm’rs, 2017 CO 104, ¶ 16. But if the plain language of the 
11

statute is “reasonably susceptible of multiple interpretations,” then 

it is ambiguous, Elder, ¶ 18. In that case, we may use other 

interpretative aids to discern the legislature’s intent, including 

consideration of the legislative history and the title of the statute, as 

well as “the consequences of a particular construction,” Broomfield 

Senior Living Owner, ¶ 17. 

B. The Language of Section 19-1-307(1)(a)

¶ 24 As noted, the statute prohibits disclosure of “reports of child 

abuse or neglect,” as well as “the name and address of any child, 

family, or informant or any other identifying information contained 

in such reports.” § 19-1-307(1)(a). The parties agree that the 

statute distinguishes between the “reports of child abuse or neglect” 

themselves, which are confidential, and certain information 

contained within “such reports,” only some of which is confidential. 

See Peck v. McCann, 43 F.4th 1116, 1125-26 (10th Cir. 2022) 

(interpreting this provision). But the parties dispute what 

information contained in reports of child abuse or neglect is 

confidential. The dispute focuses on the meaning of the phrase “the 

name and address of any child, family, or informant or any other 

identifying information.” 
12

¶ 25 As a matter of grammar, this phrase can be understood as a 

series — “a group of successive coordinate sentence elements joined 

together,” Merriam-Webster Dictionary, https://perma.cc/D8C4-

Y69 — consisting of the terms “name,” “address,” and “any other 

identifying information.” 

¶ 26 DHS argues that each term in the series constitutes 

confidential “identifying information.” It says that the phrase “or 

any other” operates as a “catch all” for additional types of 

information that are not specifically enumerated. In other words, 

while “name and address” always qualify as “identifying 

information,” that list is not exhaustive and other terms might also 

qualify. This is a reasonable reading of the provision. See, e.g., Ali 

v. Fed. Bureau of Prisons, 552 U.S. 214, 218-19 (2008) (statute that 

precludes lawsuits against “any officer of customs or excise or any 

other law enforcement officer” precludes a suit against the 

enumerated officers and every other kind of law enforcement officer, 

even ones not acting in a customs or excise capacity (quoting 28 

U.S.C. § 2680(c))); Indus. Claim Appeals Off. v. Ray, 145 P.3d 661, 

664 (Colo. 2006) (where “wages” was defined as “board, rent, 

housing, lodging, or any other similar advantages,” the phrase “‘or 
13

any other similar advantages’ provided a flexible means for 

including employment benefits not otherwise specified in the ‘wages’ 

definition” (quoting § 8-47-101(2), C.R.S. 1988)). 

¶ 27 But there is another reasonable reading of the provision. 

Under the media organizations’ construction, only addresses that 

constitute “identifying information” are confidential. The 

legislature’s choice to use the conjunctive “and” to connect “name 

and address” rather than the disjunctive “or” may signal that it did 

not intend for any address on its own to be confidential, but only 

addresses that are also disclosed with associated names. See West 

v. Roberts, 143 P.3d 1037, 1040 (Colo. 2006) (“Use of the word ‘or’ 

in a statute is presumed to be disjunctive.”). 

¶ 28 And the phrase “or any other identifying information,” even if a 

“catchall” of sorts, may limit and modify the other enumerated 

terms — here, “name and address.” Various courts, including our 

supreme court, have endorsed this rule of syntax. See United 

States v. Williams-Davis, 90 F.3d 490, 508 (D.C. Cir. 1996); Mortg.

Brokerage Co. v. Mills, 100 Colo. 267, 269, 67 P.2d 68, 69 (1937). 

Under the rule, which the Williams-Davis court described as a “sort 
14

of reverse ejusdem generis,”4 the general catchall term, “or any 

other,” “reflects back on the more specific rather than the other way 

around.” Id. at 509. So, “the phrase ‘A, B, or any other C’ indicates 

that A is a subset of C.” Id. 

¶ 29 At issue in Williams-Davis was a statute that defines when a 

person is engaged in a continuing criminal enterprise. Id. at 508. 

To fall under the statute, the person must, among other things, act 

“in concert with five or more other persons with respect to whom 

such person occupies a position of organizer, a supervisory 

position, or any other position of management.” Id. (emphasis 

omitted) (quoting 21 U.S.C. § 848(c)). The court concluded (as the 

Ninth Circuit had previously) that the phrase “any other position of 

management” limited the preceding enumerated terms such that an 

4 “The doctrine of ejusdem generis provides that when a general 

word or phrase follows a list of specific persons or things, the 

general word or phrase will be interpreted to include only persons 

or things of the same type as those listed.” Mounkes v. Indus. Claim 

Appeals Off., 251 P.3d 485, 488 (Colo. App. 2010) (where statute 

allowed for disqualification of benefits based on the “intentional 

falsification of expense accounts, inventories, or other records or 

reports,” “other records and reports” had to be interpreted to 

comprise records and reports of the same type as expense accounts 

and inventories (quoting § 8-73-108(5)(e)(VII), C.R.S. 2023))). 
15

“organizer” “must exercise some sort of managerial responsibility.” 

Id. 

¶ 30 Our supreme court used this same rule of syntax to interpret 

an “or any other” phrase in Mortgage Brokerage Co., 100 Colo. 267, 

67 P.2d 68. In that case, an employee was required by the terms of 

a bond to reimburse his employer for losses caused by the employee 

“through larceny, theft, embezzlement, forgery, misappropriation, 

wrongful abstraction, willful misapplication, or any other act of 

fraud or dishonesty.” Id. at 268, 67 P.2d at 68. The court 

interpreted the phrase “or any other act of fraud or dishonesty” to 

modify or limit the enumerated terms. Thus, while the employee 

might have committed “wrongful abstraction” or “willful 

misapplication,” he could not be liable unless he acted fraudulently 

or dishonestly, as “it [was] clear that [those terms] were to be 

construed to indicate or denote acts of fraud or dishonesty.” Id. at 

269, 67 P.2d at 69; see also Jackson v. Commonwealth, 652 S.E.2d 

111, 112-13 (Va. 2007) (statute prohibiting, in relevant part, driving 

while “under the influence of any narcotic drug or any other selfadministered intoxicant or drug” did not proscribe driving under the 
16

influence of a narcotic drug that was not self-administered (quoting 

Va. Code Ann. § 18.2-266 (West 2023))). 

¶ 31 Thus, using this rule of syntax, the phrase “any other 

identifying information” can be read as modifying or limiting the 

enumerated terms “name” and “address,” such that disclosure of an 

address is prohibited only when it constitutes “identifying 

information.” 

¶ 32 Accordingly, we conclude that the statute is ambiguous, so we 

turn to other interpretive aids to ascertain the legislature’s intent.

C. The Legislative History of Section 19-1-307(1)(a) and the 

Consequences of Adopting Either Construction

¶ 33 As we have explained, the initial iteration of the statute 

prohibited disclosure of the entire contents of a child abuse report. 

But after Gillies, the legislature amended the statute. The 

amendment indicates the “legislature’s desire to narrow the statute 

to cover only the reports themselves and identifying information 

therein.” Peck, 43 F.4th at 1126. 

¶ 34 More specifically, the amended statutory language tracked the 

distinction the district court drew in Gillies between confidential 

“identifying” information and nonconfidential information. See 38 
17

Colo. App. at 235-36, 556 P.2d at 85. In our view, by tracking that 

distinction, the legislature likely intended to also adopt the district 

court’s dividing line: confidential information is “any information 

which would identify the child, parents or informant,” and all other 

information is nonconfidential. Id. at 236, 556 P.2d at 85. 

¶ 35 And in 1996 the legislature amended the title of the provision

— from “Confidentiality of records” in the 1977 Act to “Identifying 

information — confidential.” Ch. 230, sec. 6, § 19-1-307(1)(a), 1996 

Colo. Sess. Law 1166. This amendment underscores the 

legislature’s focus on maintaining confidentiality of identifying 

information only. 

¶ 36 In light of this history, reading the statute to make any 

“address of any child, family, or informant” confidential —

regardless of whether disclosure of the address would, in fact, 

reveal the identity of a specific child, family, or informant — makes 

less sense than construing the language in accordance with the 

district court’s reasoning in Gillies. 

¶ 37 An examination of the possible consequences of adopting one 

interpretation over the other further suggests that the media 

organizations’ interpretation more accurately reflects the General 
18

Assembly’s intent. See § 2-4-203(1)(e), C.R.S. 2023 (noting that in 

construing an ambiguous statute, we may consider “[t]he 

consequences of a particular construction”). 

¶ 38 DHS’s construction would require that some nonidentifying 

information is kept confidential, a result we cannot square with the 

legislative history or even with other sections of the Children’s 

Code, which themselves authorize the public disclosure of 

information from child abuse reports, so long as the information 

does not “identify individuals.” Peck, 43 F.4th at 1136. Indeed, 

DHS’s interpretation would prohibit the disclosure of the 

information in the CPO Report and potentially subject the CPO to 

prosecution. See § 19-1-307(1)(c) (violation of section 19-1-

307(1)(a) is a petty offense, punishable by a fine).

¶ 39 DHS’s construction may also raise difficult constitutional 

problems. In Peck, the question presented was whether section 19-

1-307(1)(c) and (4), which penalize the disclosure of information 

from child abuse records and reports, violate the First Amendment. 

See Peck, 43 F.4th at 1121-22. Because section 19-1-307(1)(c) 

punishes disclosures listed in subsection (1)(a) of that statute, the 

Tenth Circuit first determined that subsection (1)(a) “reach[es] only 
19

identifying disclosures,” meaning that subsection (1)(c) does not 

“inhibit . . . disclos[ure] [of] non-identifying information.” Id. at 

1126. The plaintiff did not seek to disclose identifying information, 

however, so the court declined to reach the issue of subsection 

(1)(c)’s constitutionality. Id. But subsection (4) penalizes the 

disclosure of any data or information in a child abuse record or 

report, including nonidentifying information. Id. at 1127. The 

court concluded that subsection is unconstitutional because it is 

not narrowly tailored to the government’s compelling interest in 

protecting children, as the government could achieve that purpose 

by proscribing the disclosure only of identifying information. Id. at 

1135-37. 

¶ 40 This reasoning suggests DHS’s interpretation — which could 

prohibit the disclosure even of some nonidentifying information 

(that is, information that would not identify a particular child, 

family, or informant) — could be an unconstitutional restriction on 

free speech. By contrast, adopting the media organizations’ 

interpretation avoids this possible constitutional infirmity. See

People v. Iannicelli, 2019 CO 80, ¶ 22 (noting that “statutory terms 

should be construed in a manner that avoids constitutional
20

infirmities” (quoting People v. Zapotocky, 869 P.2d 1234, 1240 

(Colo. 1994))).

¶ 41 In sum, we conclude that the legislature intended to prohibit 

disclosure of only information that would identify a particular child, 

family, or informant associated with a child abuse or neglect report. 

¶ 42 Like the Tenth Circuit, we acknowledge that “separating 

identifying information from non-identifying information w[ill] often 

be a difficult task.” Peck, 43 F.4th at 1135. But as the Peck court 

pointed out, “[i]f Child Protection Teams” — and, we would add, the 

CPO — “are capable of distinguishing between identifying and nonidentifying information, then so too” are others at DHS. Id. at 1136. 

¶ 43 Finally, we note that the only CORA exception presented in 

this appeal was section 19-1-307(1)(a). We express no opinion on 

whether other exceptions might give DHS discretion to withhold 

records otherwise disclosable under section 19-1-307(1)(a), 

particularly in a close case. 

IV. Disposition

¶ 44 The judgment is reversed, and the case is remanded for 

further proceedings consistent with this opinion. On remand, the 

district court must determine whether, in light of our opinion, the 
21

requested records would disclose “identifying information” of a 

child, family, or informant associated with a child abuse or neglect 

report. 

JUDGE GOMEZ concurs.

JUDGE PAWAR dissents.
22

JUDGE PAWAR, dissenting.

¶ 45 According to the majority, section 19-1-307(1)(a), C.R.S. 2023, 

is ambiguous because there are two reasonable ways to read it. I 

think there is only one. In my view, the only reasonable reading is 

that names and addresses in child abuse reports are always 

confidential and protected from disclosure. I would therefore affirm 

the district court’s ruling based on the plain language of the statute 

without resorting to additional aids of statutory interpretation.

¶ 46 As the majority explains, our primary goal when interpreting 

statutes is to ascertain and give effect to the General Assembly’s 

intent. See Elder v. Williams, 2020 CO 88, ¶ 18. We do this by first 

examining the language of the statute. Id. We give the words and 

phrases the General Assembly chose their plain and ordinary 

meanings. Id. And we read those words and phrases in the context 

of the entire statutory scheme, giving “consistent, harmonious, and 

sensible effect to all of its parts.” Id.

¶ 47 We look beyond the plain language of the statute only if that 

language is ambiguous — that is, only if the language is susceptible 

of multiple reasonable interpretations. Id. An alternate 
23

interpretation is unreasonable and therefore creates no ambiguity if 

it “would lead to illogical or absurd results.” Id.

¶ 48 Section 19-1-307(1)(a) protects from disclosure child abuse 

reports and “the name and address of any child, family, or 

informant or any other identifying information contained in such 

reports.” The majority concludes that it is reasonable to read this 

language in two different ways to determine the rule for disclosing 

names or addresses in child abuse reports. First, the statute can 

be read to always protect names or addresses in child abuse 

reports from disclosure. Second, the majority employs a “sort of 

reverse ejusdem” rule of syntax, United States v. Williams-Davis, 90 

F.3d 490, 509 (D.C. Cir. 1996), to read the statute as protecting 

names or addresses from disclosure only if they constitute 

identifying information.

¶ 49 Even accepting the second interpretation as grammatically 

reasonable, I conclude it is unreasonable in substance. The 

suggestion that the General Assembly intended to protect the 

names and addresses of children in child abuse reports only in 

certain circumstances is absurd and illogical. The majority’s 

alternate interpretation would mean that a child abuse victim’s (or 
24

the family’s or informant’s) name or address would be subject to 

disclosure unless the records custodian, or a court, determines that 

such information is identifying. This is unreasonable. The only 

reasonable interpretation is that the names and addresses of 

children, families, or informants in child abuse reports are always 

confidential, as is any additional information that is identifying.5

¶ 50 The media organizations seek information linking reports of 

child abuse to particular addresses. This is information that is 

always protected under the only reasonable interpretation of section 

19-1-307(1)(a). I respectfully dissent from the majority’s contrary 

conclusion and would affirm the district court’s order.

5 Because I conclude that names and addresses of children, 

families, and informants in child abuse reports are always 

identifying information for purposes of section 19-1-307(1)(a), 

C.R.S. 2023, I need not address the majority’s constitutional 

concerns about names and addresses that might not be identifying.