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Nature of Suit Code: 895
Nature of Suit: Freedom of Information Act of 1974
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

No. 14-5275 September Term, 2015

 FILED ON: JANUARY 21, 2016

STEPHEN WHITAKER,

APPELLANT

v.

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF STATE, ET AL.,

APPELLEES

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:12-cv-00316)

Before: BROWN, Circuit Judge, and EDWARDS and WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judges.

J U D G M E N T

This appeal was considered on the record and the briefs of the parties. See FED R. APP.

34(a)(2); D.C. CIR. R. 34(j). The court has accorded the issues full consideration and has 

determined that they do not warrant a published opinion. See D.C. CIR. R. 36(d). For the reasons 

stated below, it is 

ORDERED and ADJUDGED that the grant of summary judgment be affirmed. 

On October 3, 1980, a DC-3 aircraft left Madrid, Spain with two American pilots at the 

controls, Harold William Whitaker and U.S. Army Major Lawrence Eckmann. The aircraft and 

crew would never be seen again. Years later, Harold Whitaker’s son, appellant Stephen 

Whitaker, began filing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and Privacy Act requests aimed at 

piecing together the events surrounding that tragic flight. This suit challenges the handling of his 

requests by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the State Department (Department). 

Appellant’s initial request to the CIA sought information concerning whether his father, 

other individuals, and various aircraft were “employed or contracted by the CIA for service in

Central America or elsewhere.” J.A. 24. The CIA issued a Glomar response, refusing to confirm 

or deny the existence or non-existence of responsive records. Appellant tried again, requesting 

all records linked to him or his father. Following an administrative appeal, the CIA located 

twelve responsive records related to the processing of appellant’s FOIA request. The agency 

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released portions of those records, but withheld the bulk under the deliberative process and 

attorney client privileges. See 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(5). 

Appellant had somewhat better luck with the State Department, which released a variety of 

documents related to his father’s disappearance under FOIA. However, the Department refused 

to process appellant’s request for his father’s records under the Privacy Act, consistent with the 

executive’s longstanding interpretation of the Act to preclude next-of-kin from exercising the 

access rights of the deceased. See Privacy Act Guidelines, 40 Fed. Reg. 28,948, 28,951 

(July 9, 1975).

Continuing his quest, appellant sued the agencies in federal district court. In March 2014, 

the court granted in part and denied in part the agencies’ motion for summary judgment. See

Whitaker v. CIA, 31 F. Supp. 3d 23 (D.D.C. 2014). The court later granted summary judgment 

on the remaining issues, dismissing the case with prejudice. See Whitaker v. CIA, 64 F. Supp. 3d 

55 (D.D.C. 2014). This appeal challenges only the grant of summary judgment with respect to 

(1) the CIA’s invocation of the deliberative process privilege and (2) the State Department’s 

refusal to process the Privacy Act request for records concerning appellant’s father.1

 Reviewing 

the matter de novo, Sussman v. U.S. Marshals Serv., 494 F.3d 1106, 1111–12 (D.C. Cir. 2007),

we affirm. 

First, the CIA properly invoked the deliberative process privilege. That privilege flows from 

FOIA Exemption (b)(5). See 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(5). To fall under the privilege’s penumbra, 

documents “must be both pre-decisional and deliberative.” Abtew v. U.S. Dep't of Homeland 

Sec., No. 14-5169, 2015 WL 9286818, at *2 (D.C. Cir. Dec. 22, 2015). Pre-decisional 

documents are those “generated before the adoption of an agency policy.” Coastal States Gas 

Corp. v. Dep’t of Energy, 617 F.2d 854, 866 (D.C. Cir. 1980). “And a document is deliberative 

if it is ‘a part of the agency give-and-take—of the deliberative process—by which the decision 

itself is made.’” Abtew, 2015 WL 9286818, at *2 (quoting Vaughn v. Rosen, 523 F.2d 1136, 

1144 (D.C. Cir. 1975)). 

The record in this case—including the CIA’s affidavit and the Vaughn index—supports the 

CIA’s application of the privilege. The twelve documents at issue pre-dated the CIA’s ultimate 

disposition of appellant’s requests and reflect the “give-and-take” at the core of the deliberative 

process privilege. See J.A. 64 (characterizing the documents as “predecisional deliberations by 

[CIA] personnel regarding the nature of information retrieved, the scope of legal exemptions, the 

application of exemptions to particular material, or making recommendations related to final 

Agency determinations”). That is enough to resolve the matter. 

 1 The Statement of Issues section of appellant’s brief purports to raise two other issues concerning the 

release of segregable material. See App. Br. 1–2. Because the brief never expands on either issue, they are 

waived. See Terry v. Reno, 101 F.3d 1412, 1415 (D.C. Cir. 1996) (“Simply listing the issues on review 

without briefing them does not preserve them.”). 

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Second, the State Department did not err in refusing to search for records concerning 

appellant’s father under the Privacy Act. The access provision of the Privacy Act, 5 U.S.C. 

§ 552a(d)(1), permits “any individual to gain access to his record or to any information pertaining 

to him which is contained in” an agency’s system of records. It is a limited mandate. That

provision “give[s] parties access only to their own records, not to all information pertaining to 

them that happens to be contained in a system of records.” Sussman, 494 F.3d at 1121. To the 

general rule that individuals may only access their own records, the statute provides a single 

exception: parents and legal guardians may exercise the access rights of those deemed legally 

incompetent. See 5 U.S.C. § 552a(h). Aside from these contextual cues, the statutory text is 

silent as to whether next-of-kin or third parties may exercise access rights on behalf of the 

deceased. 

Shortly after the Act’s enactment, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) 

promulgated Guidelines interpreting the Act to forbid third parties from exercising the access 

rights of deceased individuals. See 40 Fed. Reg. at 28,951. Because “Congress explicitly tasked 

the OMB with promulgating guidelines for implementing the Privacy Act . . . we therefore give 

the OMB Guidelines ‘the deference usually accorded interpretation of a statute by the agency 

charged with its administration.’” Sussman, 494 F.3d at 1120 (quoting Albright v. United States, 

631 F.2d 915, 920 n.5 (D.C. Cir. 1980)). 

Appellant attacks this line of precedent as inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s decision in 

Doe v. Chao, 540 U.S. 614 (2004). That is incorrect. Doe, decided some three years before 

Sussman, read the Privacy Act’s civil damages provision to require proof of actual damages in 

order to recover. See id. at 616. To be sure, that conclusion ran contrary to the Guidelines. See 

id. at 633 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting). But the Court did not hold that the Guidelines were not 

entitled to deference. The majority opinion simply found unpersuasive OMB’s “unelaborated 

conclusion” with respect to actual damages. Id. at 627 n.11. Justice Ginsburg’s dissenting 

opinion referenced the Guidelines’ contrary reading without, as the majority noted, “claim[ing] 

that any deference [was] due.” Id. Because Doe did not decide the issue, Sussman appropriately 

followed circuit precedent in deferring to the Guidelines. This panel has no authority to change 

course. See Save Our Cumberland Mountains, Inc. v. Hodel, 826 F.2d 43, 54 (D.C. Cir. 1987)

(Ginsburg, J., concurring) (noting that circuit precedent “binds us unless and until overturned by 

the court en banc or by Higher Authority”).

To escape the Guideline’s grip, appellant asks the court to invoke judicial estoppel based on 

what he views as the government’s conflicting positions in Doe and this case. But judicial 

estoppel is plainly not warranted where, as here, appellant points to “other litigation with other 

parties, not a past phase of this case.” Abtew, 2015 WL 9286818, at *3. And surely the 

government cannot be faulted in this litigation for “invoking . . . binding Circuit precedent that 

supported [its] clients’ positions.” Reed Elsevier, Inc. v. Muchnick, 559 U.S. 154, 170 (2010). 

We affirm the district court. 

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Pursuant to D.C. CIRCUIT RULE 36, this disposition will not be published. The Clerk is 

directed to withhold issuance of the mandate herein until seven days after resolution of any 

timely petition for rehearing or rehearing en banc. See FED R. APP. P. 41(b); D.C. CIR. R.

41(a)(1). 

Per Curiam

FOR THE COURT:

Mark J. Langer, Clerk

BY: /s/

 Ken Meadows

Deputy Clerk

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