Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-00-05211/USCOURTS-caDC-00-05211-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 550
Nature of Suit: Prisoner - Civil Rights (U.S. defendant)
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued May 7, 2001 Decided June 12, 2001

No. 00-5211

Gregory Smith,

Appellant

v.

U. S. Department of Justice,

Appellee

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 99cv00784)

Sidney A. Rosenzweig, appointed by the court, argued the

cause as amicus curiae on the side of appellant. With him on

the brief was Robert S. Litt.

Gregory Smith, appearing pro se, was on the brief for

appellant.

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Lisa Barsoomian, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the

cause for appellee. With her on the brief were Wilma A.

Lewis, U.S. Attorney at the time the brief was filed, and R.

Craig Lawrence, Assistant U.S. Attorney.

Before: Williams, Ginsburg, and Rogers, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge Ginsburg.

Ginsburg, Circuit Judge: While incarcerated at a federal

correctional institution, Gregory Smith placed several calls to

his attorney. Although an unmonitored telephone was available for this purpose, Smith used a telephone line on which he

knew all calls were monitored and recorded pursuant to a

policy of the Bureau of Prisons. Smith claims that during the

conversations the attorney effectively acknowledged that he

had not provided Smith with constitutionally adequate assistance.

Smith later asked the Bureau of Prisons, under the Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. s 552, for copies of the

recordings it made of the conversations. The Government

denied the request on the sole ground that the recordings fall

within Exemption 3 of the FOIA because Title III of the

Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act, 18 U.S.C.

ss 2510 et seq., bars their disclosure. When Smith sought

judicial review, the district court granted summary judgment

for the Government. As we read Title III it is inapplicable to

the recordings at issue. Therefore, under the FOIA Smith is

entitled to the recordings. Smith -- who appeared pro se

and briefed the case creditably both in the district court and

here -- is now aided by an amicus curiae we appointed for

the occasion; we make no further distinction between Smith's

arguments and those of the amicus.

Analysis

Exemption 3 of the FOIA makes the general requirement

of disclosure inapplicable to materials

specifically exempted from disclosure by statute ... provided that such statute (A) requires that the matters be

withheld from the public in such a manner as to leave no

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discretion on the issue, or (B) establishes particular

criteria for withholding or refers to particular types of

matters to be withheld.

5 U.S.C. s 552(b)(3). We have held that Title III, 18 U.S.C.

ss 2510 et seq., which limits the electronic interception and

disclosure of various communications, is just such an exempting statute because it "refer[s] to particular types of matters

to be withheld." Lam Lek Chong v. DEA, 929 F.2d 729, 733

(1991). Accordingly, Smith concedes that if the nondisclosure provisions of Title III apply to the recordings he

seeks, then so does Exemption 3 of the FOIA. Whether the

district court correctly granted summary judgment for the

Government therefore turns upon whether Title III proscribes disclosure of the recordings.

Subject to certain exceptions, Title III makes it unlawful

for a person to "intercept" "any wire, oral, or electronic

communication." 18 U.S.C. s 2511. The Government here

contends that the prison authorities, by recording the conversations Smith had with his attorney, "intercepted" those

communications and did so lawfully, as authorized by the

consent exception in 18 U.S.C. s 2511(2)(c) ("person acting

under of color of law [may] intercept ... where ... one of the

parties to the communication has given prior consent"). The

Government then reasons that because Title III expressly

permits certain specifically-described types of disclosure (for

example, in court testimony) of communications obtained "by

any means authorized" in Title III, 18 U.S.C. s 2517, it

implicitly forbids any other type of disclosure, including disclosure pursuant to the FOIA.

Smith correctly identifies the fundamental defect in the

Government's argument: the recordings he seeks were not

the product of an "interception," consensual or otherwise,

governed by Title III; therefore, they are not subject to

whatever limitations Title III places upon the disclosure of

information that does result from a covered interception.

Here " 'intercept' means the aural or other acquisition of ...

any wire, electronic, or oral communication through the use of

any electronic, mechanical, or other device." 8 U.S.C.

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s 2510(4). "[E]lectronic, mechanical, or other device," in

turn,

means any device or apparatus which can be used to

intercept a wire, oral, or electronic communication other

than--

(a) any telephone or telegraph instrument, equipment

or facility, or any component thereof, ...

(ii) being used ... by an investigative or law enforcement officer in the ordinary course of his

duties.

18 U.S.C. s 2510(5) (emphasis supplied). The latter definition consists first of an inclusionary clause specifying the

equipment associated with a proscribed interception, and then

of an exclusionary provision -- of which s 2510(a)(ii) is

part -- specifying "acquisitions" that remain outside the

statutory definition of an "interception." We have no doubt

that the recordings Smith seeks fall under the exclusionary

terms of s 2510(5)(a)(ii): They were obtained by "law enforcement officers" (the prison authorities) who "used," "in

the ordinary course of [their] duties," some telephone "instrument, equipment or facility, or [a] component thereof."

In fact, the Government said as much before the district

court: "The ... provisions of Title III," here citing

s 2510(5)(a)(ii) and the consent exception, "ma[d]e the taping

of these calls legal." Government's Statement of Material

Facts Not in Genuine Dispute at p 9. Evidently, the Government (and the district court) overlooked the point Smith made

in his own motion for summary judgment, namely, that

s 2510(5)(a)(ii) does not 'authorize' the recordings but instead

excludes them entirely from the coverage of the statute.

Now that Smith drives the point home, the Government has

changed its position.

The Government's current position, that the recordings do

not satisfy the terms of s 2510(5)(a)(ii), is contradicted by a

consistent line of cases admitting into evidence recordings

made by prison authorities who routinely monitor inmates'

conversations. Those cases hold that such recordings are not

unlawful under Title III because they come within the exclusionary terms of s 2510(5)(a)(ii). See, e.g., United States v.

Van Poyck, 77 F.3d 285, 292 (9th Cir. 1996); United States v.

Daniels, 902 F.2d 1238, 1245 (7th Cir. 1990); United States v.

Feekes, 879 F.2d 1562, 1565-66 (7th Cir. 1989); United States

v. Paul, 614 F.2d 115, 117 (6th Cir. 1980). Indeed, that was

the position of the Government in each of the cited cases.

The Government nonetheless posits two reasons

s 2510(5)(a)(ii) does not embrace (and hence does not exclude

from Title III) the recordings here at issue; neither has real

bite. First, the Government asserts that the exclusion provided in s 2510(5)(a)(ii) "applies only to use of a telephone to

listen, not to use of a tape recorder to record." That construction conflicts with the distinction, which is implicit in

Title III, between intercepting ("acqui[ring] the contents of

any ... communication," s 2510(4)) -- for which some prison

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telephone "instrument, equipment or facility, or [some] component thereof" was almost certainly used in this case -- and

recording that communication -- for which a separate device

well may have been used. See 18 U.S.C. s 2518(8) (a)

("contents of any ... communication intercepted by any

means authorized by this chapter shall, if possible, be recorded on tape or wire or other comparable device") (emphasis

supplied). We say "almost certainly" because the Government introduced no evidence whatsoever regarding the equipment it used to monitor the calls; more to the point, the

Government failed to prove that the means of intercepting the

calls did not involve use of the prison's telephone system or a

component thereof. Because the Government bears the burden of showing that an exemption from the FOIA applies, see

Maydak v. DOJ, 218 F.3d 760, 764 (D.C. Cir. 2000), that

failure of proof alone forecloses its first argument.

Second, the Government asserts that "section 2510(5)(a)(ii)

applies only when the telephone is 'being used by ... an

investigative or law enforcement officer,' i.e. the officer is the

person using the telephone, not when the telephone is being

used by someone else and the officer is just using the tape

recorder." The statute is not susceptible to that construction

because it embraces use not only of a telephone but of any

telephone "equipment or facility, or any component thereof,"

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18 U.S.C. s 2510(5); clearly, the law enforcement officer need

not be using the telephone itself, wherefore he need not be

participating in the conversation either. Moreover, 18 U.S.C.

s 2511(2)(c) separately authorizes "a person acting under

color of law to intercept a ... communication where such

person is a party to the conversation"; as the requirements of

that section are automatically met when a law enforcement

officer actually participates in the conversation, the Government's reading would render s 2510(5)(a)(ii) superfluous.

Finally, the Government requests in the alternative that we

remand this case to the district court so it can there for the

first time raise certain other exemptions from the FOIA.

That avenue is barred:

We have plainly and repeatedly told the government

that, as a general rule, it must assert all exemptions at

the same time, in the original district court proceedings.... FOIA was enacted to promote honesty and

reduce waste in government by exposing an agency's

performance of its statutory duties to public scrutiny....

As we have observed in the past, the delay caused by

permitting the government to raise its FOIA exemption

claims one at a time interferes both with the statutory

goals of "efficient, prompt, and full disclosure of information," ... and with "interests of judicial finality and

economy."

Maydak, 218 F.3d at 764. The Government identifies no

"extraordinary circumstance" or "interim development" of

facts or of law, id. at 767, to warrant our departing from this

rule. Therefore, it must produce the recordings notwithstanding any other FOIA exemptions it may assert in a

future case of this sort.

Conclusion

For the foregoing reasons, we hold that Smith is entitled to

the recordings he requested pursuant to the FOIA. The

judgment of the district court is, accordingly,

Reversed.

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