All I have to say about this is . . . wellllll, ahem, if the US government sells census records and they are published after 70 years (or whatever the cutoff date is!), then at worst why would this 70 year rule not apply to funeral records as well . . . I would not stop with just this one response, I would call the state attorney general and get THEIR interpretation of this statute as well. I do not believe this applies to physical records, I personally believe that it means that they cannot share with you maybe the fact that the person took their own life and they tell you all the things he did to himself; or that if a member of the family broke down and wept and carried on and said things they shouldn't have about this person, that they cannot disclose that . . . anything hurtful is what I would think this statute pertains to . . . not simply photocopying paper records and especially in that time frame!! Goodness gollies . . . now I don't think ANY of us would know in advance to speak with someone and have them give the funeral home of their choice permission to give us those copies . . . ludicrous thought . . . but I also do not think it means that only unless you had power of attorney or were the administrator of their estate either . . . nobody is collecting genie data that early in one's life most of the time . . . we all wait until everyone we want to know about is dead . . . how in the wide world you'd ever get permission from them by that time beats me . . . I would definitely need and get clarification of this statute, the place to start!! Then if it is favorable to your purpose, I'd ask if they could send that to you in writing and that emailing it is sufficient for your needs (if that would work for you!) ----- Original Message ----- From: "S. Olson" <rjo723@charter.net> To: "MINNESOTA" <MINNESOTA-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Wednesday, November 22, 2006 10:00 AM Subject: [MINNESOTA] Funeral Home Release of Information > Has anyone else had trouble, recently, with funeral homes releasing > information? This is the first time that I have encountered this (kind of > a terse response): > > The law regarding privacy issues is found under Minnesota Statute 149A.70; > (Laws pertaining to Mortuary Science) concerning unprofessional conduct. > > The law reads: > > No licensee or intern shall engage in or permit others other the > licensee's or intern's supervision or employment to engage in > unprofessional conduct. Unprofessional conduct includes, but is not > limited to: > > (Subd. 5) Revealing personally identifiable facts, data, or information > about a decedent, customer, member of the decedent's family, or employee > acquired in the practice or business without the prior consent of the > individual, except as authorized by law. > > We are sorry that we are unable to provide you with the information. > > I guess I am puzzled about the fact that the information that I am seeking > is about people who died in the late 1800's and early 1900's. I have > never had trouble with this before. > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > MINNESOTA-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >