BROOKFIELD, Wis. (AP) -- The Brookfield Police Department says it'll continue to automatically deny public access to some police files, despite advice from the state attorney general's office that it shouldn't.

Assistant Attorney General Mary Burke advised the city last month that the department's policy of flatly refusing to release police files that have been forwarded to a prosecuting attorney is not permitted under the state open records law.

But Assistant Police Chief Dean Collins says in a letter to Burke responding to her advice that the department's policy is based on the logic found in a 1994 unpublished appeals court decision.

Although conceding that the decision can't be cited as a legal precedent because it was unpublished, Collins says both he and the Brookfield city attorney find the court's reasoning to be "highly persuasive."

Collins writes, and we quote: "Hence, we propose to continue our long-standing practice of referring these records requests directly to the prosecuting attorney."

Those requests would routinely be denied under a 1991 state Supreme Court ruling that upheld a blanket exemption to the state's open records law for the prosecution files of a district attorney.

(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)