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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

Argued September 16, 2011 Decided December 20, 2011 

No. 10-5248 

THOMAS E. MOORE, III, 

APPELLANT

v. 

CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, 

APPELLEE

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the District of Columbia 

(No. 1:09-cv-01363) 

 David L. Sobel argued the cause for the appellant. 

 Jane M. Lyons, Assistant United States Attorney, argued 

the cause for the appellee. Ronald C. Machen Jr., United 

States Attorney, and R. Craig Lawrence, Assistant United 

States Attorney, were on brief. 

 Before: HENDERSON, TATEL and GRIFFITH, Circuit 

Judges. 

USCA Case #10-5248 Document #1348609 Filed: 12/20/2011 Page 1 of 9
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 Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge HENDERSON. 

 KAREN LECRAFT HENDERSON, Circuit Judge: This case 

arises under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 

U.S.C. § 552. Appellant Thomas E. Moore, III (Moore) 

challenges the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA or 

Agency) Glomar response to his request for “all information 

or records relevant to . . . Sveinn B. Valfells” (Valfells Sr.), in 

which response the Agency neither confirmed nor denied 

whether it maintained any such records.1 Specifically, Moore 

argues that the CIA has already “officially acknowledged” 

that at least some “CIA-originated information” was redacted 

from a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) report dated 

February 1956 entitled “Sveinn B. Valfells” (FBI Report or 

Report) and, under our holding in Wolf v. CIA, 473 F.3d 370 

(D.C. Cir. 2007), the Agency can no longer deny that it 

maintains that information. In our view and that of the district 

court, Moore has failed to meet his burden to demonstrate that 

the CIA has officially acknowledged any record responsive to 

his FOIA request. Although the CIA confirmed that some 

unspecified “CIA-originated information” was redacted from 

the FBI Report, Moore cannot isolate any specific CIA record 

that has been officially acknowledged by the CIA. See id. at 

378-79. Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s grant of 

summary judgment to the CIA. 

I. BACKGROUND

The relevant facts in this case are undisputed. By letters 

dated November 19, 2007, Moore submitted a series of FOIA 

 

1

 A Glomar answer is one that, for national security reasons, 

neither confirms nor denies the existence of certain requested 

agency records. The term Glomar comes from our opinion in 

Phillippi v. CIA, 546 F.2d 1009 (D.C. Cir. 1976), which involved a 

FOIA request for information regarding the “Hughes Glomar 

Explorer,” a deep-sea exploratory vessel. 

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requests to the United States Department of Justice (DOJ), the 

CIA and the United States Department of State on behalf of 

his client, Sveinn Valfells (Valfells). The requests sought 

information regarding Valfells’ grandfather, Valfells Sr., an 

Icelandic textile merchant who spent time in the United States 

during the 1940s and 1950s and who allegedly had ties to the 

Icelandic Communist Party (ICP). 

On December 17, 2007, the CIA responded to Moore’s 

request, stating that “the CIA can neither confirm nor deny 

the existence or nonexistence of records responsive to this 

part of your request.” Letter from Scott Koch to Moore at 1 

(Dec. 17, 2007). The CIA relied on FOIA exemptions (b)(1) 

and (b)(3) to support its response.2

 

 

2

 Exemption (b)(1) permits an agency to withhold matters from 

FOIA disclosure if such matters are “(A) specifically authorized 

under criteria established by an Executive order to be kept secret in 

the interest of national defense or foreign policy and (B) are in fact 

properly classified pursuant to such Executive order.” 5 U.S.C. 

§ 552(b)(1). Pursuant to Executive Order 12,958, an agency may 

withhold information if its disclosure could reasonably be expected 

to reveal classified intelligence sources or methods or otherwise 

damage the foreign relations of the United States. See Exec. Order 

No. 12,958, 70 Fed. Reg. 21,609 (Apr. 21, 2005). 

Exemption (b)(3) shields matters “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 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. § 552(b)(3) (effective Nov. 27, 2002 to Dec. 

30, 2007). The National Security Act of 1947, as amended, 

mandates that the Director of National Intelligence protect 

intelligence sources and methods from unauthorized disclosure. See 

50 U.S.C. § 403g; id. § 403-1(i)(1). In his appeal, Moore does not 

challenge whether the CIA appropriately asserted its (b)(1) and 

(b)(3) exemptions. 

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In April 2008, in response to Moore’s request to the DOJ, 

the FBI referred three pages of its Report to the CIA for 

coordination.3 The CIA responded that certain CIA-originated 

information in that document should be withheld to protect 

classified intelligence sources and methods. The FBI 

subsequently released a redacted version of the Report to 

Moore on May 9, 2008. The Report states that, in January 

1956, “T-1, an agency of the U. S. Government which 

conducts intelligence investigations,” furnished the FBI with 

information indicating that Valfells Sr. had ties to the ICP. 

Report at 11. Although the Report does not specifically state 

that T-1 is the CIA, in a section entitled “Administrative 

Data,” the Report identifies the CIA as a source of 

information contained in the Report: “This report is being 

designated ‘SECRET’ inasmuch as the file in the Security 

Office of the U. S. State Department and the information from 

CIA, which has been set forth in the body of this report[,] was 

so classified.” Report at 12. 

On July 23, 2009, after Moore’s efforts to obtain the 

requested records from the CIA failed, Moore filed suit in the 

district court challenging its Glomar response. The CIA 

moved to dismiss or, in the alternative, for summary judgment 

and submitted the declaration of CIA Information Review 

Officer Ralph DiMaio (DiMaio) in support of its motion. In 

his declaration, DiMaio confirmed inter alia that in April 

2008 the CIA “ask[ed] the FBI to withhold certain CIAoriginated information [from the FBI Report] . . . in order to 

 

3

 The coordination was completed pursuant to Executive Order 

12,958, section 3.6(b), which requires an agency that receives a 

request for documents containing information that was originally 

classified by another agency to refer copies of the request and the 

pertinent documents to the originating agency for processing. Exec. 

Order. No. 12,958, 60 Fed. Reg. 19,825 (Apr. 17, 1995), amended 

by Exec. Order No. 13,292, 68 Fed. Reg. 15,315 (Mar. 25, 2003). 

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protect intelligence sources and methods.” Moore 

subsequently cross-moved for partial summary judgment, 

arguing that, given DiMaio’s acknowledgment, the CIA had 

waived its right to issue a Glomar response. 

The district court disagreed and, on June 17, 2010, it 

granted summary judgment to the CIA and denied Moore’s 

cross-motion. Valfells v. CIA, 717 F. Supp. 2d 110 (D.D.C. 

2010). First, the court noted that the FBI lacked the authority 

to make an official acknowledgment on behalf of the CIA; 

thus, the release of the Report by the FBI had no bearing on 

the CIA’s ability to issue a Glomar response. Id. at 118. 

Second, the court found that, although DiMaio’s declaration 

made clear that some CIA-originated information had been 

withheld from the FBI Report, his declaration officially 

acknowledged, at most, the specific information redacted 

from the Report. Id. at 120. Because Moore did not challenge 

the redactions, the court held that all reasonably segregable 

information had already been released to Moore. Id. Moore 

now appeals. 

II. ANALYSIS

 “[A]n agency may refuse to confirm or deny the 

existence of records where to answer the FOIA inquiry would 

cause harm cognizable under a FOIA exception.” Gardels v. 

CIA, 689 F.2d 1100, 1103 (D.C. Cir. 1982). Such a 

response—commonly known as a Glomar response—is 

proper if the existence vel non of an agency record is itself 

exempt from disclosure. Wolf, 473 F.3d at 374 (citing Hunt v. 

CIA, 981 F.2d 1116, 1118 (9th Cir. 1992); Phillippi v. CIA, 

546 F.2d 1009, 1011 (D.C. Cir. 1976)). If, however, the 

agency has officially acknowledged the existence of the 

record, the agency can no longer use a Glomar response, id. at 

378, and instead must either: (1) disclose the record to the 

requester or (2) establish that its contents are exempt from 

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disclosure and that such exemption has not been waived, id. at 

379-80. 

In his appeal, Moore does not challenge the CIA’s 

reliance on exemptions (b)(1) and (b)(3) nor does he dispute 

that a Glomar response is proper where the existence or 

nonexistence of an agency record falls within a FOIA 

exemption. Instead, Moore argues that the CIA has officially 

acknowledged that it maintains information responsive to 

Moore’s FOIA request and, therefore, can no longer use a 

Glomar answer in responding to his request. Specifically, 

Moore points to the October 8, 2008 DiMaio declaration in 

which DiMaio recited that the CIA asked the FBI to redact 

some “CIA-originated information” from the Report in order 

to protect CIA intelligence sources and methods. In our view, 

the DiMaio declaration does not constitute an official 

acknowledgment sufficient to waive Glomar.

4

 

“[W]hen information has been ‘officially acknowledged,’ 

its disclosure may be compelled even over an agency’s 

otherwise valid exemption claim.” Fitzgibbon v. CIA, 911 

F.2d 755, 765 (D.C. Cir. 1990). But “[a] strict test applies to 

claims of official disclosure.” Wilson v. CIA, 586 F.3d 171, 

186 (2d Cir. 2009). To be officially disclosed: “(1) the 

information requested must be as specific as the information 

previously released; (2) the information requested must match 

the information previously disclosed; and (3) the information 

requested must already have been made public through an 

official and documented disclosure.” Am. Civil Liberties 

 

4

 Additionally, to the extent Moore suggests that the release of 

the Report by the FBI constitutes an official acknowledgment by the 

CIA, his argument is foreclosed by our precedent. “[W]e do not 

deem ‘official’ a disclosure made by someone other than the agency 

from which the information is being sought.” Frugone v. CIA, 169 

F.3d 772, 774 (D.C. Cir. 1999). Thus, “only the CIA can waive its 

right to assert an exemption to the FOIA.” Id. at 775. 

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Union v. U.S. Dep’t of Def., 628 F.3d 612, 620-21 (D.C. Cir. 

2011). Thus, “a plaintiff asserting a claim of prior disclosure 

must bear the initial burden of pointing to specific 

information in the public domain that appears to duplicate that 

being withheld.” Afshar v. Dep’t of State, 702 F.2d 1125, 

1130 (D.C. Cir. 1983). 

In Wolf v. CIA, where we first addressed the official 

acknowledgment doctrine in the Glomar context, we again 

applied it strictly. There, we made plain that, in order to 

overcome an agency’s Glomar response based on an official 

acknowledgment, the requesting plaintiff must pinpoint an 

agency record that both matches the plaintiff’s request and 

has been publicly and officially acknowledged by the agency. 

See Wolf, 473 F.3d at 378-79; see also Wilner v. Nat’l Sec. 

Agency, 592 F.3d 60, 70 (2d Cir. 2009) (agency only 

“precluded from making a Glomar response if the existence 

or nonexistence of the specific records sought by the FOIA 

request has been the subject of an official public 

acknowledgment” (citing Wolf, 473 F.3d at 378-79; Hudson 

River Sloop Clearwater, Inc. v. Dep’t of the Navy, 891 F.2d 

414, 421 (2d Cir. 1989) (emphasis added))). 

In Wolf, the plaintiff, a historical researcher, requested 

“all records about Jorge Eliecer Gaitan” (Gaitan), a 

Colombian presidential candidate who was assassinated in 

Bogota, Colombia in 1948. 473 F.3d at 372-73 (internal 

quotation marks omitted). After the CIA issued a Glomar 

answer to Wolf’s request, Wolf filed suit. He claimed that the 

CIA had waived its right to issue a Glomar response because 

former CIA director Admiral R.K. Hillenkoetter 

(Hillenkoetter) publicly acknowledged the existence of CIA 

records regarding Gaitan nearly 50 years before Wolf’s 

request. Specifically, Wolf pointed to Hillenkoetter’s 

congressional testimony shortly after Gaitan’s assassination in 

1948, during which testimony Hillenkoetter read excerpts 

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from CIA dispatches referencing Gaitan, his associates and 

their ties to the communist party in Colombia. The district 

court rejected Wolf’s official acknowledgment argument and 

granted summary judgment to the Agency. 

We reversed the district court, holding, in light of 

Hillenkoetter’s congressional testimony, that “the Agency’s 

Glomar response [did] not suffice regarding the dispatch 

excerpts that reference Gaitan because the same ‘officially 

acknowledge’ the fact that CIA records ‘about Jorge Eliecer 

Gaitan’ exist.” Id. at 379. Although we concluded that the 

Agency had waived its Glomar response as to those officially 

acknowledged dispatches, we also held that it had not waived 

its Glomar response as to all records about Gaitan. Instead, 

Wolf was entitled to disclosure of “the existence of CIA 

records about Gaitan that have been previously disclosed (but 

not any others).” Id. (emphasis added). We thus remanded the 

case to the district court to “determine whether the contents—

as distinguished from the existence—of the officially 

acknowledged records” were exempt from disclosure. Id. at 

380 (emphasis removed). 

Unlike in Wolf, DiMaio’s declaration does not identify 

specific records or dispatches matching Moore’s FOIA 

request. Indeed, because the CIA-originated information was 

redacted before the FBI released its Report to him, Moore 

cannot show that the redacted information even relates to 

Valfells Sr. All Moore can establish is that some unspecified 

“CIA-originated information” was redacted from the Report. 

Whereas Wolf identified specific records that had been 

officially acknowledged by Hillenkoetter’s testimony quoting 

therefrom, Moore can only speculate as to what (if any) 

records the CIA might have about Valfells Sr. In the highly 

sensitive context involving issues of national security, 

however, “[a]n agency’s official acknowledgment . . . cannot 

be based on . . . speculation, no matter how widespread.” Id.

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at 378. As we noted in Wolf, “[t]he insistence on exactitude 

recognizes ‘the Government’s vital interest in information 

relating to national security and foreign affairs.’ ” Id. at 378 

(quoting Pub. Citizen v. Dep’t of State, 11 F.3d 198, 203 

(D.C. Cir 1993)). The CIA has properly answered Moore’s 

FOIA request with a Glomar response.

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court’s 

judgment. 

 So ordered.

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