Title 42: Public Health
PART 2—CONFIDENTIALITY OF ALCOHOL AND DRUG ABUSE PATIENT RECORDS
Subpart E—Court Orders Authorizing Disclosure and Use
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§ 2.66 Procedures and criteria for orders authorizing disclosure and use of records to investigate or prosecute a program or the person holding the records.
(a) Application. (1) An order authorizing the disclosure or use of patient records to criminally or administratively investigate or prosecute a program or the person holding the records (or employees or agents of that program or person) may be applied for by any administrative, regulatory, supervisory, investigative, law enforcement, or prosecutorial agency having jurisdiction over the program's or person's activities.
(2) The application may be filed separately or as part of a pending civil or criminal action against a program or the person holding the records (or agents or employees of the program or person) in which it appears that the patient records are needed to provide material evidence. The application must use a fictitious name, such as John Doe, to refer to any patient and may not contain or otherwise disclose any patient identifying information unless the court has ordered the record of the proceeding sealed from public scrutiny or the patient has given a written consent (meeting the requirements of §2.31 of these regulations) to that disclosure.
(b) Notice not required. An application under this section may, in the discretion of the court, be granted without notice. Although no express notice is required to the program, to the person holding the records, or to any patient whose records are to be disclosed, upon implementation of an order so granted any of the above persons must be afforded an opportunity to seek revocation or amendment of that order, limited to the presentation of evidence on the statutory and regulatory criteria for the issuance of the court order.
(c) Requirements for order. An order under this section must be entered in accordance with, and comply with the requirements of, paragraphs (d) and (e) of §2.64 of these regulations.
(d) Limitations on disclosure and use of patient identifying information: (1) An order entered under this section must require the deletion of patient identifying information from any documents made available to the public.
(2) No information obtained under this section may be used to conduct any investigation or prosecution of a patient, or be used as the basis for an application for an order under §2.65 of these regulations.
