FOIA Advisor

Court opinions issued Nov. 28, 2022

Court Opinions (2015-2023)Allan BlutsteinComment

Ryan, LLC v. U.S. Dep't of Interior (5th Cir.) -- in reverse-FOIA case concerning tax adviser’s “formula” for recovering overpaid royalties, vacating and remanding district court’s decision after concluding that district court and agency did not “fully explore the record or the Supreme Court’s decision in Food Marketing Institute v. Argus Leader Media, 139 S. Ct. 2356 (2019).”

Shem-Tov v. DOJ (D.D.C.) -- dismissing case for failure to prosecute because plaintiff, who sought records to defend herself in her criminal trial in Israel, neglected to contact the court for nearly five months and disregarded three court orders during that time period.

Competitive Enter. Inst. v. Podesta (D.D.C.) -- dismissing two defendants from case, John Podesta and the National Climate Task Force, because neither are agencies subject to FOIA.

Accuracy in Media v. DOD (D.D.C.) -- in case involving records related to the 2012 attack on the United States Embassy in Benghazi, Libya, adopting magistrate judge’s report and recommendation finding that: (1) DOD performed adequate search for records and properly withheld 12 pages of maps pursuant to Exemption 1; (2) CIA properly relied on Exemption 3 in conjunction with the CIA Act of 1949 and National Security Act of 1947 to withhold records related to a complaint sent to CIA’s Inspector General; and (3) issue of FBI’s Glomar response was moot because FBI agreed to search for requested records after the magistrate issued his recommendation.

Summaries of all published opinions issued since April 2015 are available here.