Thanks for the suggestions / information Crazy Babe and Anne (and the others higher up the thread
).
I did some more hunting around a couple of days ago and found some useful looking documents about the Freedom of Information Act in the US (as well as a bunch of stuff about the Public Records Office in the UK.) Re the FOIA: some of the material I found was quite difficult to get my head around -- ah, confusion! -- but that's fine, at least as far at the story goes. So long as I can make things plausible, I'm happy.
So... one day in the very dim and distant future I might have another story to share with you. Don't hold you're collective breath, though. As I'm sure you have all figured out by now, I am a very slow writer.
Chris
