Records Management News

Records May Hold Answers to Atrocities in Guatemala

A large cache of mildewed police files found in a Guatemalan munitions depot may hold clues to the truth behind decades of state-sponsored kidnapping and assassinations. The reams and reams of documents bundled and stacked up to 10 feet high in bat-infested rooms may look like a giant trash heap, but for human rights investigators it is a hidden treasure.

Found last summer, this collection of records appears to be the complete files of the National Police. The agency was disbanded as part of the 1996 peace accords due to its involvement in human rights abuses during the more than three decades of civil unrest in Guatemala. Mildewed and messy but still intact the documents represent a complete accounting of governments actions.

The files, in various stages of decay, date back more than a century and contain enough documents to stretch the length of 130 football fields. The documents had been found inadvertently as part of as safety inspection of a munitions depot, prompted by complaints by neighbors that explosives were being improperly stored at the sight. As the New York Times wrote, "the neighbors did not know the half of it."

At the UW we don't know the half of it either. Although we certainly don't have records of atrocities, we do have valuable records that have been thrown into closets and basements and forgotten. Necessary to protect the legal position of the University and the rights and interests of students and employees, there is rarely knowledge that these records still exist or what they actually contain.

How do we avoid this situation? Contact Records Management Services. We produce Records Retention Schedules that tell you when records can legally be destroyed and we offer inactive storage at the University Records Center until that time. Secure and accountable, the University Records Center is the UW's best defense against mildewed and messy hidden treasures.