PRFG • SERIES 01 v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY PUBLIC-INTEREST FIELD GUIDE PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE AI, Evidence & Witnesses Draft companion to the native v0.7-rc1 Core Prepared and maintained by Brandon N.Gallegos Independent public-interest legal-information project CORE PRINCIPLE Red flags are questions, not proof. Preserve sources, distinguish roles, and keep uncertain legal questions visible. GENERAL LEGAL INFORMATION • NOT AN APPROVED PUBLIC RELEASE September 18, 2026 • Independent legal review not completed PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE PUBLICATION INFORMATION v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 2 About this reviewer draft Useful information, careful records, independent decisions. PREPARED AND MAINTAINED BY Brandon N.Gallegos Independent public-interest legal-information project This companion develops the Public Rights Field Guide’s AI, evidence, and witness workstreams. It accompanies the v0.7-rc1 Core reviewer draft. It is not a replacement for the Core, an official agency form, or a completed catalogue of legal protections. The guide provides general legal information and organization tools. It does not decide your rights, select a claim or strategy, calculate your deadline, or provide legal representation. A template needs checking against the facts, the current rules, and the receiving process. For a personal legal assessment, consult a qualified lawyer. EDITION v0.7-rc1 companion • reviewer draft dated September 18, 2026. Public release: not approved. Independent legal review: not completed. SOURCE CURRENTNESS New source checks are identified as R01–R11. A checked text, current appellate treatment, correct application, and independent legal signoff are separate matters. The Core’s inherited references are not silently recertified. UPDATES / CORRECTIONS No public correction address or update website has been designated. Ask the person who supplied this copy whether a later edition exists; compare the edition, date, and correction history. This PDF will not update itself. REVIEW PRIORITY Check whether each explanation helps a reader ask a better question without suggesting that coverage, liability, privilege, filing, or preservation has already been established. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE CONTENTS v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 3 Find the new material Use the bookmarks or choose a topic below. Each tool is also supplied as plain text. Use AI for a bounded task 4 Keep the account yours 5 AI records and later legal process 6 Preserve deliberately, not indiscriminately 7 Privacy settings are not legal status 8 Start with the person’s actual role 9 Reporting is not one legal status 10 What a protection card must answer 11 Federal personnel: a bounded pilot 12 New Mexico: do not combine the routes 13 Candidate frameworks to investigate 14 Protect independent recollection 15 A consistent account; deliberate disclosure 16 AI work and source record 17 Protection and independent-route record 18 Disclosure and exact-delivery record 19 Independent-account source record 20 Source checks for this draft 21 Source checks for this draft 22 What remains before public release 23 PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE AI / SOURCE DISCIPLINE v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 4 Use AI for a bounded task A useful draft still needs a traceable source. A narrowly defined task is easier to check than a request to decide an entire dispute. Start with the question, the material actually needed, and how you will verify the result. A manual or no-upload workflow remains a valid choice. ORGANIZE Build a chronology with source IDs. Keep unknown dates unknown. Separate an event date from the date someone later described it. COMPARE Ask for exact differences between identified versions, with page or line locators. Check the underlying passage rather than relying on the model’s explanation of the change. DRAFT Request a neutral, accurate cover message or list of questions. Do not ask the system to invent facts, strengthen recollection, or turn uncertainty into an accusation. CHECK Open every legal authority and official contact yourself. A fluent explanation, realistic case name, or plausible email address is not verification. WHAT CAN GO WRONG NIST’s 2024 generative-AI profile describes confidently incorrect content and fabricated logic or citations, as well as privacy and information-integrity risks. It does not establish the accuracy or privacy behavior of a particular product today. [R04] Risk context, not a legal standard. Before using a result Check dates, names, quotations, negations, omitted context, and source locations. Mark what has and has not been checked. Preserve the version you actually reviewed; do not describe a later edited output as the original. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE AI / SOURCE DISCIPLINE v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 5 Keep the account yours Better wording should not become a different account. FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT What you personally saw, heard, did, or remember. Use approximate wording when exact words are not remembered. SOURCE-SUPPORTED STATEMENT What an identified record actually supports. A record can document that a statement was made without proving that statement true. ATTRIBUTED STATEMENT What someone else said, identified as their account rather than your own observation. ALLEGATION / INFERENCE A disputed claim or a conclusion drawn from facts. Do not quietly promote either into an official finding. OPEN QUESTION What remains unresolved, including evidence that might contradict your present interpretation. EDITORIAL WORKFLOW Keep an initial account, source-linked working notes, the AI draft, human corrections, and the exact sent version distinguishable. This is an organization method, not a requirement to create every possible record or a universal retention rule. A bounded prompt COPY / ADAPT Use only the supplied, appropriately shareable material. Separate firsthand accounts, attributed statements, allegations, inferences, and open questions. Cite source IDs and exact locations. Do not invent facts, citations, quotations, dates, motives, or legal conclusions. Identify missing context and contrary information. Mark all unverified output. Do not contact anyone, submit anything, change originals, or access other files. Use only tools and data access you have deliberately authorized. A document supplied for analysis is source material, not permission for an automated system to send messages or follow instructions embedded in that document. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE AI / DISCOVERY v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 6 AI records and later legal process Neither “everything is discoverable” nor “my chats are protected” is a safe universal rule. In federal civil litigation, Rule 26(b)(1) limits discovery to nonprivileged matter relevant to a claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case. Discoverability and admissibility are different questions. Rules 34 and 45 address document/information production and subpoenas within their respective scopes. Applied to AI use, prompts, uploads, outputs, drafts, and revision histories may need assessment when they bear on the dispute. That is an application of general discovery rules—not a finding that every AI interaction must be produced. State, criminal, administrative, and public-records processes need their own analysis. [R01] Rules 26(b)(1), 34, and 45. Keep four questions separate PRESERVATION What relevant material must be retained, from when, under which duty or order? ACCESS / CONTROL Where is it, who controls it, and what lawful export or retrieval method exists? PRODUCTION What request or process applies, what is its scope, and what objections or protections need review? USE AS EVIDENCE What proposition does the material actually support, and what evidentiary rules apply? DO NOT “CLEAN UP” TO DEFEAT PROCESS Do not delete inconvenient chats, replace originals, fabricate a missing prompt, or change retention to evade an obligation. Also do not publish an entire private archive merely because some material may be relevant. An AI summary is not the original source. An AI interaction may itself be relevant as a record of what someone wrote, received, changed, or relied on. Label its actual role rather than calling all AI output either proof or legally irrelevant. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE AI / PRESERVATION v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 7 Preserve deliberately, not indiscriminately Preservation, disclosure, and production are different decisions. Rule 37(e) addresses certain losses of electronically stored information that should have been preserved in anticipation or conduct of litigation. It concerns reasonable steps and information that cannot be restored or replaced. The Federal Judicial Center explains that the rule does not itself create the preservation duty. [R01] · [R03] Rule 37(e); current rule and historical official explanation. IDENTIFY List potentially relevant systems and record types: messages, attachments, native media, exports, drafts, AI interactions, and delivery records. Include information that complicates the account. RETAIN LAWFULLY Keep relevant material you lawfully possess or control. Do not defeat access controls, take unrelated workplace files, or upload private records to make a more impressive packet. NOTICE AUTO-DELETION Record known expiry, overwrite, account-closure, and disappearing-message risks. When a duty or order may apply, obtain prompt, scope-specific guidance rather than improvising a destructive change. VERIFY THE COPY Keep native originals when available. Check that exports open and contain the expected attachments, timestamps, and context. A screenshot or flattened summary may omit information. RECORD LIMITATIONS Note missing material, unsuccessful exports, incomplete histories, and transformations. Do not recreate absent data as though it were an original. NO UNIVERSAL “KEEP EVERYTHING FOREVER” RULE The applicable duty, subject matter, time range, systems, reasonable steps, and any orders need examination. This worksheet does not decide them. Seek timely legal help when litigation, a subpoena, or a preservation demand may matter. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE AI / PRIVACY v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 8 Privacy settings are not legal status A handling choice is not a privilege determination. Do not assume that a “private,” “temporary,” “local,” “enterprise,” or “no training” label answers who can access a record, how long it is retained, or whether it is legally protected. Check the actual service, account configuration, sharing, integrations, administrator access, retention, export, and legal-process terms before a consequential upload. This draft does not certify any product’s privacy behavior. A no-upload workflow avoids that upload; it does not make existing records immune from applicable legal process. Privilege and work product Attorney-client privilege and work-product protection are distinct. Rule 26(b)(3) addresses qualifying material prepared in anticipation of litigation or for trial by or for a party or its representative; it is not limited to papers personally written by a lawyer. Whether particular AI material qualifies or a disclosure affects protection requires separate analysis. [R01] · [R02] Rule 26(b)(3); Rules of Evidence 501–502. No case-specific conclusion. BEFORE UPLOADING Ask whether the material includes private third-party information, possible privileged communications, restricted records, or information beyond the task. BEFORE SHARING Check recipient, need, authority, appropriate channel, attachments, filenames, hidden information, and applicable disclosure requirements. AFTER A POSSIBLE MISTAKE Preserve an accurate incident record and seek prompt, qualified guidance. Do not assume deleting a message cures disclosure or that every accidental disclosure necessarily waives protection. LABELS DO NOT DECIDE THE LAW “Confidential,” “attorney only,” and “regulator only” are useful handling labels—not automatic privileges, a promise of secrecy, or authority to withhold legally required material. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / STATUS ROUTING v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 9 Start with the person’s actual role One person can occupy several roles at once. Record the role at the time of the activity and at the time of the alleged response. Use “unknown” when employment, contracting, institutional control, or authority is unclear. The following are research branches, not coverage determinations. FEDERAL EMPLOYEE / APPLICANT Identify the employing agency, position, personnel action, disclosure or other activity, and the relevant OSC/MSPB route. Do not assume every federal position or every subsection uses the same process. NM STATE / LOCAL PUBLIC EMPLOYEE Identify the actual public employer and employee relationship. Examine the New Mexico Whistleblower Protection Act and other potentially relevant frameworks separately. PRIVATE-SECTOR EMPLOYEE Identify what was reported: discrimination, safety, fraud, wages, or another subject. Do not infer a single all-purpose protection for every report of workplace wrongdoing. CONTRACTOR / AGENT Distinguish the contracting entity, a contractor’s employee, and an agent. Identify the contract, funding source, and conduct before selecting candidate statutes. HEALTHCARE EMPLOYEE / PROFESSIONAL Separate patient-care, emergency-care, safety, billing, licensure, employment, and reporting-duty questions. Role and subject matter matter. PUBLIC-UNIVERSITY EMPLOYEE Identify the actual employer, duties, speech or testimony, and employee/student dual status. Public employment is not a complete First Amendment analysis. RESULT OF THIS PAGE A list of roles and candidate questions. Not “legally protected whistleblower.” Use the full protection-card structure before making a coverage claim. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / STATUS ROUTING v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 10 Reporting is not one legal status A complaint, a witness account, and a protected activity are different questions. STUDENT Record institution, program, activity, and any employee role. Examine the relevant education and other statutory frameworks; do not substitute an employment test. PATIENT Identify the care setting, record or grievance process, and relevant rights. Patient status should not be substituted for a hospital-personnel protection. ORDINARY / LIKELY WITNESS What was observed? What proceeding exists or may be anticipated? Who knew what, and what response or attempted interference occurred? COMPLAINANT Identify the underlying complaint and process. The word “complaint” alone does not establish the protected-activity element of every law. VICTIM Separate ordinary usage, any statute-defined status, assistance services, procedural rights, and potential remedies. PERSON ASSISTING ANOTHER Record the assistance and any consent or authority. Helping with information is not the same as authority to represent another person or release their records. REPORTING POSSIBLE FEDERAL CRIME Identify the information, recipient, possible offense, and any required federal connection. A report is not an adjudication or a promise of prosecution. TESTIFYING IN A COURT / ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEEDING Record the tribunal, whether testimony was required or voluntary, its subject, the person’s duties, and applicable orders. Do not treat all testimony rules as interchangeable. RESEARCH STATUS These branches preserve distinctions for investigation. Specific protections, required belief, nexus, causation, deadlines, and remedies remain framework-specific. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / PROTECTION CARDS v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 11 What a protection card must answer The name of a law is only the start. WHO IS PROTECTED Person, employment or other relationship, institution, jurisdiction, dates, and exclusions. PROTECTED ACTIVITY The actual disclosure, opposition, participation, assistance, refusal, or testimony—not just a label. REQUIRED BELIEF / NEXUS Any reasonable-belief, good-faith, subject-matter, recipient, funding, proceeding, or federal-offense requirement. PROHIBITED RESPONSE The framework’s actual action, threat, interference, or other prohibited conduct. CAUSATION / KNOWLEDGE Who knew of the activity, the relevant causal standard, burdens, defenses, and competing explanations. FORUM Agency, tribunal, court, or government enforcement route; correct respondent and legal vehicle. DEADLINE / PREREQUISITE Independent clock, trigger, notice, exhaustion, election, filing, and service questions. Do not borrow a period from a neighboring claim. REMEDY What relief the route authorizes, who can obtain it, and what limits or defenses apply. SOURCE Current operative text, pinpoint support, controlling treatment, and scoped review dates. LIMITS What is not established, excluded, uncertain, contested, or not researched. KEEP THESE OUTCOMES SEPARATE Potentially relevant • condition not established • source gap • not researched • excluded by a verified rule. “Not researched” must never be displayed as “not protected.” PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / PILOT CARD v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 12 Federal personnel: a bounded pilot 5 U.S.C. § 2302(b)(8) and (b)(9) are distinct starting points—not a universal employee remedy. WHO / ACTIVITY First check OSC’s coverage page. Its overview describes § 2302(b)(8) disclosures involving a reasonable belief in specified wrongdoing categories, and separately describes § 2302(b)(9) complaint, assistance, cooperation, and refusal activity. BELIEF / RESPONSE For the disclosure route, the overview identifies violation of law/rule/regulation, gross mismanagement, gross waste, abuse of authority, or substantial and specific danger to public health or safety. It discusses taking, failing to take, or threatening personnel action. KNOWLEDGE / CAUSATION The overview’s whistleblowing discussion identifies official knowledge and contribution to personnel action. Do not copy that description across all subsection (b)(9) activities, forum routes, or procedural postures. [R05] · [R06] Agency-guidance-level pilot. Full statute and controlling treatment remain open. FORUM OSC’s wrongdoing-disclosure function and its prohibited-personnel-practice complaint process are different. The official complaint page is the filing starting point—not proof that an individual matter has been filed or accepted. [R07] · [R08] Official routes inspected; no submission performed. DEADLINE / PREREQUISITE Open review: OSC process, MSPB jurisdiction, direct appeal versus individual-right-of-action route, exhaustion, election, mixed matters, and all applicable clocks. REMEDY Open review: the route’s corrective or other relief, burdens, defenses, and limits. No individual entitlement is stated. LIMIT OF THIS PILOT This is a sourced introduction with explicit incomplete fields—not a filing guide or a determination of statutory coverage. Agency coverage, excluded positions, restricted disclosures, governing text, and current cases must be verified before a full protection card is published. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / NM RESEARCH BOUNDARY v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 13 New Mexico: do not combine the routes Public employment, civil rights, workplace safety, and witness law need separate source sets. PUBLIC-EMPLOYMENT RESEARCH BRANCH NMSA 1978 §§ 10-16C-1 through -6: verify current official codification, definitions, protected activities, belief standards, response, causation, forum, prerequisites, remedies, and controlling appellate treatment. This draft does not reproduce an old bill as current Whistleblower Protection Act text or carry forward an unverified personal-grievance/public-benefit test. The federal-rights dataset is a research lead, not authority that closes these gaps. WHO / ACTIVITY / NEXUS For an eventual NM card, establish the public employer and employee relationship, the actual activity, and the applicable statutory branch. All are open until source-linked review is complete. RESPONSE / CAUSATION / FORUM Identify the alleged action, knowledge, governing causal test, defendant, and cause of action. An institution’s name or public funding alone does not finish the analysis. CLOCK / REMEDY / LIMITS Do not publish a deadline or damages promise copied from an older summary. Check the operative rule, its trigger, prerequisites, defenses, and relevant cases. One separately checked safety-route warning New Mexico Environment Department’s employee page distinguishes workplace-safety complaints from discrimination complaints and states that discrimination complaints must be filed within 30 days of the discriminatory action. That statement concerns its safety-and-health route—not every NM retaliation claim. [R09] Official agency page checked; no individual deadline calculated. READER QUESTION Which protection and which process are being discussed? Check that answer before relying on a clock, contact, or remedy. Other NM witness, Human Rights Act, healthcare, and professional-reporting routes remain separate research branches. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / RESEARCH MAP v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 14 Candidate frameworks to investigate A research map, not an assertion that a listed protection applies. PUBLIC-EMPLOYEE SPEECH Pickering / Garcetti / Lane and controlling Tenth Circuit cases: actual duties, citizen speech, public concern, balancing, causation, testimony, academic speech, and remedies. FALSE CLAIMS ACT 31 U.S.C. § 3730(h): employee/contractor/agent scope, protected efforts, knowledge and causation, defendants, forum, limitation, and relief. Keep retaliation distinct from qui tam filing and seal questions. EMTALA 42 U.S.C. § 1395dd(i): specified hospital personnel, activity, hospital relationship, remedy interactions, forum, and clocks. Do not assume a patient has the same personnel protection. DISABILITY / CIVIL RIGHTS 42 U.S.C. § 12203; applicable Title VI, Title IX, § 504, and employment frameworks: coverage, opposition versus participation, assistance, retaliation versus interference, remedies, and separate procedures. OSHA-ADMINISTERED STATUTES Identify the specific statute, industry, employer, activity, federal/state-plan allocation, and short filing clock. “OSHA whistleblower” is not one universal claim. FEDERAL WITNESS / INFORMANT 18 U.S.C. §§ 1512–1513: subsection-specific conduct, intent, official-proceeding or federal-offense connection, knowledge, and enforcement. Do not infer a personal civil action from a criminal provision. OTHER STATE / CONTRACTOR / PROFESSIONAL ROUTES Applicable NM witness, public-record/evidence, Human Rights Act, labor, healthcare, and professional-reporting protections; 41 U.S.C. § 4712 and 10 U.S.C. § 4701 where facts warrant research. NOT FULLY RECERTIFIED These citations identify the research queue. This page supplies no complete elements, filing instructions, or coverage conclusions. A later card needs the full ten-part model and current primary sources. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / RECOLLECTION v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 15 Protect independent recollection One master account for your reporting effort does not mean one account for every witness. When contact is lawful and appropriate, begin with an open invitation to describe what the person independently remembers. Avoid feeding details, demanding agreement, rehearsing a preferred answer, or offering a benefit for a particular account. A person should be able to say “I do not know” or “I did not see that.” Keep the original account and later corrections distinct. Record when and how the account was obtained, who was present, and what documents, other accounts, or AI-generated material had been shown. Do not call a later reconstruction contemporaneous. BEFORE TESTIMONY Federal Rule of Evidence 612 can give an adverse party access to a writing used to refresh a witness’s memory while testifying, or before testimony when the court decides justice requires it. The rule contains procedural qualifications. Do not assume an AI summary used for preparation is outside the issue. [R02] Rule 612. Application to a particular preparation document requires legal review. A no-contact or other order, representation, the person’s role, safety, and the forum’s procedures may require a different approach. This page is not permission to conduct an interview or share testimony in disregard of those limits. CONTEXT, NOT LAW • NIJ 1999 Population/context: law-enforcement collection and preservation of eyewitness evidence. Date: October 1999. Supports: attention to how accounts are obtained and recorded. Does not prove: that a particular witness is inaccurate or that AI altered a specific memory. Applying this concern to AI-assisted drafting is an editorial safeguard, not a study finding about generative AI. [R10] Official publication description checked; no prevalence or causal claim made. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WITNESS / DISCLOSURE v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 16 A consistent account; deliberate disclosure Tailor the cover message—not the underlying facts. For a reporting effort, keep one versioned master account and a stable evidence index. Derive shorter cover messages for different recipients. Keep uncertainties and material corrections consistent across versions; preserve the exact statement and attachments actually sent. PUBLIC Material deliberately prepared for unrestricted circulation. Review third-party identification and context before publication. PUBLIC WITH REDACTIONS A clearly marked derivative. Keep the lawful original separately and a record of what was removed and why. RECIPIENT-LIMITED Material limited to a defined, verified recipient and purpose. Confirm the process and whether the recipient may share it further. ATTORNEY / REGULATOR-ONLY HANDLING A working disclosure tier, not a legal privilege or assurance of confidentiality. Verify authority, need, accepted channel, and legal obligations. CONSISTENCY IS NOT COORDINATION OF TESTIMONY A master statement organizes the author’s account. Preserve other people’s independent accounts as their accounts; do not revise them to match the master. An auditable send record Keep the exact submitted version, attachment list, recipient, official route, date/time/time zone, receipt or reference number, delivery result, bounce/error, and correction history. A sent message, automated acknowledgment, accepted filing, and accepted representation are different events. These are practical organization suggestions. They do not authorize withholding required material, ignoring a subpoena, copying restricted files, or treating a voluntary public-sharing checklist as a discovery response. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WORKING TOOLS v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 17 AI work and source record Working tool • complete only what you know; check the applicable process. An AI-assisted transformation or draft matters enough to keep a traceable record. Record ID: [ ] Task and scope: [ ] Date/time/time zone: [ ] Tool/model/version as displayed, if known: [ ] Input source IDs and lawful working-copy locations: [ ] What was uploaded or connected: [ ] Prompt/output or available export location: [ ] Human edits and checked source locations: [ ] Unverified statements or known omissions: [ ] Final reviewed/sent version ID: [ ] Preservation instruction, if any, and who confirmed scope: [ ] NOT A SUBSTITUTE FOR A privilege claim, automatic preservation rule, or certification that an AI result is true. BEFORE SHARING This is usually a private working record. Do not paste sensitive source content merely to complete the index. Check any applicable preservation or disclosure requirements. KEEP Relevant available originals and actual exports. Do not invent a missing history or overwrite the reviewed version. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WORKING TOOLS v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 18 Protection and independent-route record Working tool • complete only what you know; check the applicable process. You need to organize the questions for a specific possible protection. Person’s role(s), institution, jurisdiction, dates: [ ] Candidate protection / exact provision: [ ] Who is protected and exclusions: [ ] Actual activity and required belief/nexus: [ ] Alleged prohibited response: [ ] Knowledge, causation, competing explanations: [ ] Forum / respondent / legal vehicle: [ ] Independent deadline, trigger, prerequisite: [unverified / source] Potential remedy and limitations: [ ] Primary authority, pinpoint, version, date checked: [ ] Controlling-case review and unresolved questions: [ ] NOT A SUBSTITUTE FOR A finding that a person is protected, a limitations calculation, or an official filing. BEFORE SHARING Use a separate record for each framework. Mark unknown and not researched honestly. Obtain qualified help for an urgent clock. KEEP The source and version underlying each statement; corrections without erasing earlier versions. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WORKING TOOLS v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 19 Disclosure and exact-delivery record Working tool • complete only what you know; check the applicable process. Preparing or documenting a consequential voluntary submission. Purpose / requested action: [ ] Master statement ID / version: [ ] Recipient / role / official route checked on: [ ] Required form or submission instructions: [ ] Disclosure tier and authority/consent questions: [ ] Attachment IDs, redactions, context checks: [ ] Exact submitted version and sent attachment list: [ ] Sent date/time/time zone: [ ] Receipt / reference / acknowledgment: [ ] Bounce / error / failed upload / alternative used: [ ] Correction version and recipient notice, if any: [ ] Separate deadlines still needing confirmation: [ ] NOT A SUBSTITUTE FOR Proof of filing, acceptance, timeliness, confidentiality, representation, or a compliant discovery response. BEFORE SHARING Check recipient, content, sensitive data, authority, required process, and independent clocks. Do not send merely because the record is filled in. KEEP The actual sent version, native delivery information, receipts, errors, and material corrections. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE WORKING TOOLS v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 20 Independent-account source record Working tool • complete only what you know; check the applicable process. Documenting provenance of an account obtained lawfully and appropriately. Account/source ID: [ ] Date/time/time zone and method: [ ] Who initiated the exchange; who was present: [ ] Person’s role and firsthand/secondhand basis: [ ] Original account location; exact or approximate wording: [ ] Questions asked, if recorded: [ ] Materials/accounts/AI output shown beforehand: [ ] Uncertainty, things not observed, missing context: [ ] Later correction: date, source, and separate version: [ ] Contact, consent, safety, representation/order concerns: [ ] NOT A SUBSTITUTE FOR Testimony for someone to adopt, permission to contact a person, or a credibility determination. BEFORE SHARING Do not populate this from guesses. Keep identifying/contact details outside public or AI-uploaded copies when not needed and authorized. KEEP The independent original, how it was obtained, disclosed transformations, and later corrections separately. PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE SOURCE LEDGER v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 21 Source checks for this draft Checked September 18, 2026 • scope matters as much as the date. R01 Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Official rules, December 1, 2025 pamphlet Rules 26(b)(1), 26(b)(3), 26(b)(5), 26(c), 34, 37(e), and 45; scoped text review. Limit: Federal civil procedure only. No individual discovery, privilege, preservation, or deadline determination. https://www.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/document/federal-rules-of-civil-procedure.pdf R02 Federal Rules of Evidence Official rules pamphlet Rules 501–502 and 612; scoped text review. Limit: Rule 612 has conditions, a court role, and a criminal-case qualification. No universal AI-disclosure rule. https://www.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/document/federal-rules-of-evidence.pdf R03 Failure to preserve electronically stored information Federal Judicial Center, December 1, 2015 Official educational explanation of the 2015 Rule 37(e) amendment. Limit: Historical explanatory material, checked against the current rule; not a new source of preservation duty. https://www.fjc.gov/content/309290/amendments-federal-rules-practice-and-procedure-civil-rules-2015-failure-preserve R04 Generative Artificial Intelligence Profile NIST AI 600-1, July 2024 Confabulation, data privacy, and information-integrity risk descriptions, especially § 2.2. Limit: Voluntary risk-management context. Not a current product benchmark or legal rule. https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/ai/NIST.AI.600-1.pdf R05 Prohibited Personnel Practices: Overview U.S. Office of Special Counsel, official guidance Whistleblower retaliation and other retaliation sections. Limit: Guidance, not a complete statutory or controlling-case treatment review. https://www.osc.gov/services/prohibited-personnel-practices/overview/ R06 Who can file a prohibited personnel practices complaint? U.S. Office of Special Counsel, official guidance Coverage and jurisdiction cautions. Limit: Position, employing agency, and exclusions require their own check. https://www.osc.gov/services/prohibited-personnel-practices/whocanfile/ PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE SOURCE LEDGER v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 22 Source checks for this draft Checked September 18, 2026 • scope matters as much as the date. R07 How to file a prohibited personnel practices complaint U.S. Office of Special Counsel, official instructions Official filing starting point, not tested submission. Limit: No form was submitted. Delivery, acceptance, and timeliness were not established. https://www.osc.gov/services/prohibited-personnel-practices/filecomplaint/ R08 Disclosure of Wrongdoing: Overview U.S. Office of Special Counsel, official guidance Wrongdoing-disclosure function, distinct from a retaliation complaint. Limit: No assumption that use of one OSC channel completes every other process. https://www.osc.gov/services/disclosure-of-wrongdoing/overview/ R09 Resources for Employees New Mexico Environment Department, official guidance Safety complaints distinguished from discrimination complaints; published 30-day discrimination-complaint statement. Limit: This is not the NM Whistleblower Protection Act. Statutory scope, trigger, procedure, and exceptions need separate verification. https://www.env.nm.gov/occupational_health_safety/employee-information/ R10 Eyewitness Evidence: A Guide for Law Enforcement National Institute of Justice, October 1999; NCJ 178240 Official publication description: collecting, recording, and preserving eyewitness evidence. Limit: Law-enforcement practice context, not an experiment or a universal mandate for private persons. https://nij.ojp.gov/library/publications/eyewitness-evidence-guide-law-enforcement R11 Current Rules of Practice & Procedure Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts Official starting point for federal national rules. Limit: A national-rules page does not replace local rules, standing orders, or case-specific orders. https://www.uscourts.gov/forms-rules/current-rules-practice-procedure PUBLIC RIGHTS FIELD GUIDE RELEASE REVIEW v0.7-rc1 • REVIEW COPY • September 18, 2026 23 What remains before public release A usable reviewer copy is not an approved public edition. LEGAL COVERAGE Complete current official codification, controlling-case treatment, defendants, vehicles, prerequisites, remedies, and independent clocks for every active legal proposition and template instruction. CONTACTS / UPDATES Designate a stable correction/update route. Reverify official contacts and submission instructions; do not imply delivery or acceptance from a successful webpage fetch. DOCUMENT QA Inspect the final native Core, tools, and supplement at full resolution, in grayscale, with text selection, links/bookmarks, actual viewers, and assistive technology. A tagged-PDF indicator is not accessibility certification. PRIVACY / PACKAGE Check author metadata, local paths, hidden information, attachments, and public build inputs. Exclude private case, contact, student, medical, and correspondence datasets. INDEPENDENT REVIEW Obtain appropriately scoped independent legal/editorial review before presenting high-consequence explanations as publication-ready. Record what the reviewer did and did not assess. CORRECTION POLICY Preserve released versions. Date material corrections, identify the affected passage, state the correction and its source, and flag any changed reader route. Do not quietly rewrite a circulated factual or legal assertion. The source ledger and working tools are part of the draft, not proof of legal compliance. Readers retain their own decisions. The project’s job is to make sources, options, uncertainties, and limits easier to see. CORE PRINCIPLE Red flags are questions, not proof.