Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca7-14-02295/USCOURTS-ca7-14-02295-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________

No. 14-2295

SCOTT DAHLSTROM, HUGH GALLAGLY,

PETER KELLY, ROBERT SHEA,

and EMMET WELCH,

Plaintiffs-Appellees,

v.

SUN-TIMES MEDIA, LLC,

Defendant-Appellant.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 1:12-cv-00658 — Harry D. Leinenweber, Judge.

____________________

ARGUED NOVEMBER 14, 2014 — DECIDED FEBRUARY 6, 2015

____________________

Before BAUER, FLAUM, and TINDER, Circuit Judges.

FLAUM, Circuit Judge. The Driver’s Privacy Protection Act

(“DPPA”), 18 U.S.C. § 2721 et seq., prohibits individuals from 

knowingly obtaining or disclosing “personal information” 

from a motor vehicle record. In this interlocutory appeal, 

five Chicago police officers brought suit against Sun-Times 

Media, alleging that the publishing company violated the 

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DPPA by obtaining each officer’s birth date, height, weight, 

hair color, and eye color from the Illinois Secretary of State’s 

motor vehicle records, and publishing that information in a 

newspaper article that criticized a homicide investigation 

lineup in which the officers participated. Sun-Times moved 

to dismiss the officers’ complaint, arguing that the published 

information does not constitute “personal information”

within the meaning of the DPPA, or, in the alternative, that 

the statute’s prohibition on acquiring and disclosing personal 

information from driving records violates the First Amendment’s guarantees of free speech and freedom of the press.

As to the question of statutory interpretation, we conclude that the DPPA’s definition of “personal information” 

extends to the details Sun-Times published here. With respect to the First Amendment challenge, we conclude that 

Sun-Times possesses no constitutional right either to obtain

the officers’ personal information from government records 

or to subsequently publish that unlawfully obtained information. We therefore affirm the district court’s denial of SunTimes’s motion to dismiss.

I. Background

Twenty-one-year-old David Koschman died after an 

April 25, 2004 altercation with R.J. Vanecko, a nephew of 

Richard M. Daley, then-Mayor of Chicago. Given Vanecko’s 

political connections, the subsequent Chicago Police Department investigation was highly publicized. Several weeks 

after the incident, the Department placed Vanecko in an 

eyewitness lineup, in which five Chicago police officers participated as “fillers.” These officers—plaintiffs Scott Dahlstrom, Hugh Gallagly, Peter Kelly, Robert Shea, and Emmet 

Welch (“the Officers”)—closely resembled Vanecko in age, 

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height, build, and complexion. When eyewitnesses failed to 

positively identify Vanecko as the perpetrator, the Department declined to charge him. The Department closed the 

Koschman investigation in March 2011.1

Suspicious that the Department may have manipulated 

the homicide investigation because of Vanecko’s high-profile 

Chicago connections, defendant Sun-Times Media published 

a series of investigative reports criticizing the Department’s 

handling of the case. One such report, a November 21, 2011

article featured in the Chicago Sun-Times (and on the newspaper’s website), questioned the legitimacy of the Vanecko 

lineup. The article, “Daley Nephew Biggest Guy on Scene, 

But Not in Lineup,” highlights the physical resemblance between Vanecko and the lineup “fillers” in an effort to 

demonstrate that the Officers resembled Vanecko too closely 

for the lineup to be reliable. To support this accusation, SunTimes published photographs of the lineup, as well as the 

names of each of the five officer “fillers.” Sun-Times obtained these names and photographs from the Chicago Police Department pursuant to a request under the Illinois 

Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”), 5 Ill. Comp. Stat. 140. 

However, the Sun-Times article featured not only the lineup 

1 Subsequently, the Circuit Court of Cook County appointed a special 

prosecutor to investigate the circumstances surrounding Koschman’s 

death. See In re Appointment of Special Prosecutor, No. 2011 Misc. 46 (Cir. 

Ct. Cook Cnty. Apr. 23, 2012). In December 2012, Vanecko was indicted 

and charged with a single count of involuntary manslaughter. He pleaded guilty in January 2014.

 

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photographs and the Officers’ full names,2 but also the 

months and years of their birth, their heights, weights, hair 

colors, and eye colors. Sun-Times credited the Chicago Police Department and the Illinois Secretary of State as sources. 

The Officers contend—and Sun-Times has not disputed—

that Sun-Times knowingly obtained this additional identifying information from motor vehicle records maintained by 

the Secretary of State.

The Driver’s Privacy Protection Act (“DPPA”), 18 U.S.C. 

§ 2721 et seq., enacted by Congress in 1994, states that, subject to certain limited exceptions not relevant here,3 “[i]t shall 

2 On appeal, the Officers expressly allege that Sun-Times acquired only 

their first and last names via the FOIA request, and obtained their middle initials and suffixes from state motor vehicle records. The district 

court, however, determined that “[a]lthough the Complaint refers to 

[Sun-Times] using Plaintiffs’ ‘names’ to obtain their ‘full names,’ this 

does not clearly allege that the names, as published, reflected data from 

motor vehicle records instead of the FOIA request.” The court therefore 

determined that Sun-Times’s publication of the Officers’ full names 

could not support a claim under the DPPA. Because the exclusion of 

middle initials and suffixes from the range of information Sun-Times 

allegedly acquired from the Officers’ driving records does not substantially affect our analysis, we do not reexamine the district court’s determination.

3 18 U.S.C. § 2721(b) creates fourteen “permissible use” exceptions, 

which set forth limited circumstances under which obtaining or disclosing information from a motor vehicle record is permitted. The district 

court, in its denial of Sun-Times’s motion to dismiss, noted, “Defendant 

does not contend that its publication of Plaintiffs’ personal information 

falls within any of these enumerated circumstances.” On appeal, however, Sun-Times argues that its use of the Officers’ information satisfies the 

exception codified at § 2721(b)(14), which permits disclosure “[f]or any 

... use specifically authorized under the law of the State that holds the 

 

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No. 14-2295 5

be unlawful for any person knowingly to obtain or disclose 

personal information[] from a motor vehicle record.” 18 

U.S.C. § 2722(a). A separate provision of the Act specifically 

proscribes officers, employees, and contractors of state departments of motor vehicles from knowingly disclosing that 

same information. § 2721(a). The DPPA defines “personal 

information” as

information that identifies an individual, including an individual’s photograph, social security number, driver identification number, 

name, address (but not the 5-digit zip code), 

telephone number, and medical or disability 

information, but does not include information 

on vehicular accidents, driving violations, and 

driver’s status.

§ 2725(3). The DPPA provides a private right of action for 

any individual whose personal information has been obtained or disclosed in violation of the Act. § 2724(a).

record, if such use is related to the operation of a motor vehicle or public 

safety.” Because the district court did not address this issue, and more 

importantly, because it poses a mixed question of law and fact unsuitable for interlocutory review, we decline to consider it here. See Ahrenholz 

v. Bd. of Trs. of Univ. of Ill., 219 F.3d 674, 676–77 (7th Cir. 2000) (explaining 

that interlocutory review should be reserved for “pure” questions of 

law); cf. Senne v. Vill. of Palatine, Ill., 695 F.3d 597, 608 (7th Cir. 2012) (en 

banc) (concluding that whether a challenged disclosure was made for a 

permissible purpose under § 2721(b) could not be resolved at the motionto-dismiss stage). We therefore proceed under the assumption that if the 

Officers’ information constitutes “personal information” under the 

DPPA, Sun-Times has indeed committed a violation of the Act.

 

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The Officers sued Sun-Times in the United States District 

Court for the Northern District of Illinois, claiming that by 

acquiring and publishing each Officer’s approximate birth 

date, height, weight, hair color, and eye color, Sun-Times violated their rights under § 2722(a). They seek a declaratory 

judgment that Sun-Times violated the DPPA, an injunction 

requiring Sun-Times to permanently remove their information from its publications, actual and statutory damages, 

and punitive damages. The Officers do not challenge SunTimes’s publication of their photographs or names, as they 

concede that Sun-Times lawfully obtained that information 

pursuant to its FOIA request.

Sun-Times moved to dismiss the Officers’ complaint for 

failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted,

pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). SunTimes contends that the published information does not fall 

within the DPPA’s definition of “personal information,” or,

alternatively, that if the DPPA bars Sun-Times from publishing this truthful information of public concern, the statute

violates the First Amendment’s guarantees of freedom of 

speech and freedom of the press. Sun-Times also argues that 

the Officers’ requested injunction, if issued, would amount 

to an unconstitutional prior restraint on speech.

In September 2012, the district court determined that the 

challenged information does fall within the scope of “personal information” under the DPPA, and that Sun-Times’s 

acquisition and publication of the Officers’ information 

therefore violated the Act. Because this conclusion required 

the court to reach Sun-Times’s First Amendment challenge 

to an act of Congress, the court temporarily continued the 

motion in order to permit the United States to intervene to 

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No. 14-2295 7

defend the constitutionality of the Act. After the government 

declined to participate, the district court ruled in November 

2013 that the DPPA’s prohibition on Sun-Times’s obtainment 

and publication of the Officers’ personal information does 

not violate the First Amendment. Although noting that the 

Officers had yet to demonstrate the necessity of an injunction against Sun-Times, the court also ruled that the requested injunction would not amount to an unconstitutional prior 

restraint.

Sun-Times then requested that the district court certify its 

orders for interlocutory appeal. Concluding that both the

statutory interpretation issue and the constitutional challenge to the DPPA’s prohibitions present “controlling question[s] of law as to which there is substantial ground for difference of opinion and that an immediate appeal ... may materially advance the ultimate termination of the litigation,” 

the district court granted Sun-Times’s motion pursuant to 28 

U.S.C. § 1292(b) in April 2014.4 We granted Sun-Times’s petition for interlocutory appeal, and further granted the United 

4 The district court did not certify the prior restraint question for interlocutory appeal, and we decline Sun-Times’s invitation to address the 

issue. As the district court noted, the Officers’ request for damages 

would stand even if an injunction were unavailable. Thus, the constitutionality of the hypothetical injunction does not present a “controlling” 

question of law and is ill-suited for interlocutory review. See Homeland 

Stores, Inc. v. Resolution Trust Corp., 17 F.3d 1269, 1272 (10th Cir. 1994)

(“[W]hether injunctive relief is available ... is not ... an alternate controlling question. ... Because we hold ... that [plaintiff]’s complaint does 

state a claim and, at minimum, relief would be available in the form of 

damages at law, we need not decide on the availability of any specific 

type of alternate relief here.”).

 

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States’ motion to intervene to defend the constitutionality of 

the DPPA and to address the antecedent statutory question regarding the definition of “personal information” under the Act.

II. Discussion

We review de novo questions of law presented on interlocutory appeal. Triad Assocs., Inc. v. Robinson, 10 F.3d 492, 495 (7th 

Cir. 1993).

A. Definition of “Personal Information”

The DPPA proscribes knowingly obtaining or disclosing 

“personal information” from motor vehicle records. 18 

U.S.C. § 2722(a). Sun-Times contends that the details it acquired from the Officers’ driving records—i.e., each Officer’s 

birth date, height, weight, hair color, and eye color—fall outside the statutory definition of “personal information” and 

that, therefore, Sun-Times’s acquisition and publication of 

the Officers’ information did not violate the Act. However, 

we conclude, based on the plain meaning of the DPPA’s text, 

the underlying purpose of the Act, and language from prior 

decisions of this court and others, that the DPPA’s definition 

of “personal information” encompasses the information at 

issue here.

“As in any case of statutory construction, our analysis 

begins with the language of the statute. ... Interpretation of a 

word or phrase depends upon reading the whole statutory 

text, considering the purpose and context of the statute.” 

Senne v. Vill. of Palatine, Ill., 695 F.3d 597, 601 (7th Cir. 2012) 

(en banc) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).

The DPPA’s definition of “personal information” expressly 

“includ[es] an individual’s photograph, social security number, driver identification number, name, address (but not the 

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5-digit zip code), telephone number, and medical or disability information.” 18 U.S.C. § 2725(3) (emphasis added). SunTimes emphasizes that none of the information at issue here 

is explicitly included in this definition, and argues that any 

category not specifically listed must therefore lie beyond the 

Act’s reach. In so arguing, Sun-Times advocates the application of the interpretive canon expressio unius est exclusio alterius, or “the expression of one thing suggests the exclusion of 

others.” Exelon Generation Co. v. Local 15, Int’l Bhd. of Elec. 

Workers, AFL-CIO, 676 F.3d 566, 571 (7th Cir. 2012). However, the Supreme Court has explained that the term “including”—which introduces the itemized list of characteristics 

that constitute “personal information” under the DPPA, see

§ 2725(3)—is typically “illustrative and not limitative.” 

Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., 510 U.S. 569, 577 (1994); see 

also Phelps Dodge Corp. v. N.L.R.B., 313 U.S. 177, 189 (1941) 

(“To attribute such a [limitative] function to the participial 

phrase introduced by ‘including’ is to shrivel a versatile 

principle to an illustrative application. ... The word ‘including’ does not lend itself to such destructive significance.”).

This court has also noted the disfavored status of the expressio unius doctrine. See, e.g., Exelon Generation Co., 676 F.3d at 

571 (referring to “the much-derided maxim of expressio unius 

est exclusio alterius”).

On its face, the DPPA’s language appears broad: “‘personal information’ means information that identifies an individual,” § 2725(3), and there is no indication that Congress 

intended the enumerated list of examples to be exhaustive. 

The Supreme Court, albeit in dicta, has also signaled that 

“personal information” may well include categories of information beyond those specifically identified in the statute: 

in Reno v. Condon, the Court noted that “[t]he DPPA defines 

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‘personal information’ as any information ‘that identifies an 

individual.’” 528 U.S. 141, 144 (2000) (emphasis added). Reno 

dealt not with the issue of statutory interpretation, but rather

with whether Congress’s enactment of the DPPA violated 

either the Commerce Clause or the principles of federalism 

contained in the Tenth Amendment. See id. at 148–51. While 

it is possible that the Court unconsciously read the modifier 

“any” into the statutory text, it is equally plausible that the 

Court was subtly advocating an expansive reading of the 

term “personal information.”

Each category of published information at issue here 

(age, height, weight, hair color, eye color) relates to the Officers’ physical appearance and, therefore, indisputably aids 

in “identif[ying]” them. Yet Sun-Times insists that this information is merely descriptive and cannot be said to “identif[y] an individual” because it does not uniquely single out a 

particular person as does, for example, a Social Security 

number. However, the categories of “personal information” 

explicitly included in § 2725(3) directly undermine SunTimes’s theory. Although many of the itemized categories

(e.g., driver identification number) do uniquely identify the 

individual with whom they are associated, others (e.g., medical and disability information) do not. In fact, even though 

medical and disability information do not uniquely pertain 

to a single individual, they are included in a subcategory of 

“highly restricted personal information,” which receives

even greater protection under the DPPA. See 18 U.S.C. 

§ 2725(4). The express inclusion of these categories of information in § 2725(3) clearly demonstrates that Congress intended “personal information” to encompass a broader 

range of personal details than Sun-Times’s proposed reading 

would allow.

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The underlying purpose of the DPPA also supports reading “personal information” to extend to the personal details

at issue here. The DPPA was enacted as a public safety 

measure, designed to prevent stalkers and criminals from 

utilizing motor vehicle records to acquire information about 

their victims. Prior to the law’s enactment, anyone could 

contact the department of motor vehicles in most states and, 

simply by providing a license plate number and paying a 

nominal fee, obtain the corresponding driver’s address and 

other pertinent biographical information—no questions 

asked. 140 Cong. Rec. H2526 (daily ed. Apr. 20, 1994) (statement of Rep. Porter Goss). At congressional hearings on the 

proposed legislation, numerous witnesses testified about the 

risks posed by unfettered public access to motor vehicle records.5 The most highly publicized impetus for the Act’s passage was the 1989 murder of television actress Rebecca 

Schaeffer by an obsessed fan who obtained her unlisted 

5 Law enforcement officers were among those to testify. Police sergeant 

Donald L. Cahill, who spoke on behalf of the Fraternal Order of Police, 

commented on the concerns of officers who were targeted for retribution:

[N]umerous law enforcement officers over the years 

[have] had concerns about the ability of defendants, that

they had helped prosecute; to surveil them at their place 

of employment and get their license plate number, and 

in turn trace that number through the state division of 

motor vehicles to get their home addresses. These officers feared for the safety of their families mostly as most 

of their time was spent away on the job.

The Driver’s Privacy Protection Act of 1993: Hearing on H.R. 3365 Before the 

Subcomm. on Civil & Constitutional Rights of the H. Comm. on the Judiciary,

103d Cong., 1994 WL 212833 (Feb. 3, 1994) (statement of Donald L. Cahill, Legislative Chairman, Fraternal Order of Police).

 

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home address from the California Department of Motor Vehicles. Maracich v. Spears, 133 S. Ct. 2191, 2213 (2013) (Ginsburg, J., dissenting). The DPPA’s legislative history reveals 

that “[t]he intent of [the Act] is simple—to protect the personal privacy and safety of all American licensed drivers.” 

140 Cong. Rec. H2526. Although a potential stalker would 

likely require information beyond hair and eye color to positively identify his victim, details regarding any pertinent 

physical feature would make such identification easier. Interpreting the DPPA’s definition of “personal information” 

to include the identifying information at issue here would 

therefore advance the Act’s important public safety goals.

A secondary purpose of the DPPA is similarly relevant to 

the challenged categories of information. The Supreme 

Court noted in Maracich v. Spears that Congress also enacted 

the DPPA to protect against “the States’ common practice of 

selling personal information to businesses engaged in direct 

marketing and solicitation.” 133 S. Ct. at 2198 (majority opinion). Much of the information at issue here, particularly details regarding an individual’s age, height, and weight, could 

conceivably be of great interest to businesses (e.g., Weight 

Watchers) seeking to market their products or services to 

targeted audiences. While protection against commercial solicitation may not be as fundamental as the Act’s public safety objectives, excluding these categories of information from 

the DPPA’s definition of “personal information” would likely contravene legislative intent.

An expansive reading of “personal information” is further supported by the language of several cases, including a 

recent decision from our own court. Although the definition 

of “personal information” under 18 U.S.C. § 2725(3) was not 

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specifically at issue in these cases, they nevertheless provide 

helpful guidance as to the term’s appropriate interpretation. 

In our 2012 en banc decision, Senne v. Village of Palatine, Illinois, where we dealt with the DPPA’s “permissible use” exceptions, we noted that “[t]he otherwise protected information actually disclosed here included [plaintiff’s] full 

name, address, driver’s license number, date of birth, sex,

height, and weight.” 695 F.3d at 608 (emphases added). Other 

courts have also understood the DPPA’s definition of “personal information” to encompass these personal characteristics. See, e.g., Johnson v. W. Publ’g Corp., 801 F. Supp. 2d 862, 

877 (W.D. Mo. 2011) (noting that “[a] potential stalker cannot 

walk into a Missouri DMV to obtain every Missouri driver’s 

name, address, height, weight, eye color, driver’s license number, and social security number without a specific permissible use under the DPPA” (emphasis added)), rev’d on other 

grounds, 504 F. App’x 531 (8th Cir. 2013); Manso v. Santamarina & Assocs., No. 04 Civ. 10276, 2005 WL 975854, at *2–3 

(S.D.N.Y. Apr. 26, 2005) (explaining that plaintiff’s “name, 

address, date of birth, height, gender, eye color, New York State 

Motor Vehicle Identification Number, restrictive lens status, 

license class, license status and license expiration date” 

“does qualify as ‘personal information’ under the DPPA”

(emphases added)). Although these decisions are not dispositive, they indicate that the great weight of the case law supports interpreting the statute’s coverage to extend to the information at issue here.6

6 The lone authority that Sun-Times invokes in support of its position is 

Camara v. Metro-North Railroad Co., 596 F. Supp. 2d 517, a 2009 opinion 

from the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut. The

 

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Based on the foregoing analysis, we conclude that each 

Officer’s approximate date of birth, height, weight, hair color, and eye color fall within the range of “personal information” to which the DPPA’s protections apply. Sun-Times 

therefore violated the Act when it knowingly obtained the 

Officers’ personal details from the Illinois Secretary of State 

and proceeded to publish them.

Sun-Times objects that this reading of “personal information” renders the DPPA void for vagueness because it incorporates categories of information not explicitly enumerated in the statute, which will allegedly force “men of common intelligence ... to guess at the meaning of the criminal 

law.”7 Smith v. Goguen, 415 U.S. 566, 574 (1974) (citation and 

Camara court, “[a]pplying the interpretive doctrine of expressio unius est 

exclusio alterius,” concluded in a footnote that an individual’s birth date 

does not fall within the DPPA’s definition of “personal information.” Id. 

at 523 n.9. As we explain above, we do not believe that the doctrine of 

expressio unius is applicable here, and Camara offers no persuasive reason—indeed, no reason at all—to prompt us to reconsider our position.

7 Sun-Times protests that the Officers “cannot explain how the Secretary 

of State’s office, let alone lay reporters, could intuit that the contours of 

the DPPA definition for ‘personal information’ were broader than expressly stated.” But at least one prominent organization dedicated solely 

to providing free legal assistance to reporters has interpreted “personal 

information” to include the published information at issue here. The Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press (“RCFP”), a nonprofit 

organization that has provided legal advice, resources, and advocacy to 

journalists for more than forty years—see About Us, Reporters Committee 

for the Freedom of the Press, www.rcfp.org/about—issued a 2010 guide, 

which explains the rights of journalists under various federal privacy 

protection laws, including the DPPA. That guide describes the DPPA’s 

scope as follows:

 

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internal quotation marks omitted). However, the reading of 

§ 2725(3) that we adopt today does not strain the DPPA’s

plain meaning, directly advances its underlying legislative 

goals, and has been implicitly adopted by several courts. Information including age, hair color, eye color, weight, and 

height falls squarely within the universe of information that 

“identifies” an individual and, therefore, our interpretation

is “clear and precise enough to give a person of ordinary intelligence fair notice about what is required of him.” Wis. 

Right to Life, Inc. v. Barland, 751 F.3d 804, 835 (7th Cir. 2014).

B. First Amendment Analysis

Having established that the information in question is 

“personal information” within the meaning of the DPPA, we 

turn to Sun-Times’s challenge to the constitutionality of the 

statute itself, as applied to the facts of this case. Sun-Times 

contends that, in preventing the media from obtaining 

The protected privacy information includes all of the information attached to a person’s driver’s license record and 

application, such as their name, address, telephone number, vehicle description, Social Security Number, driver 

identification number, photograph, height, weight, gender, age, driving-related medical conditions and fingerprints. The law does not, however, protect a driver’s 

traffic violations, accidents or current license status from 

release.

Reporters Comm. for the Freedom of the Press, FERPA, HIPAA & DPPA: 

How Federal Privacy Laws Affect Newsgathering 4 (Spring 2010), available at

http://www.rcfp.org/rcfp/orders/docs/FHD.pdf (emphases added). This 

language indicates that one of the primary legal resources for “lay reporters” has long interpreted the DPPA’s definition of “personal information” as we do today.

 

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information from an individual’s motor vehicle record and 

publishing that information, the DPPA violates the First 

Amendment’s guarantees of free speech and freedom of the 

press. Because the DPPA proscribes both obtaining personal 

information from driving records and subsequently disclosing that information, we address the constitutionality of each 

prohibition in turn. 

1. The DPPA’s Prohibition on Obtaining Personal Information

Sun-Times first argues that the DPPA’s prohibition on

obtaining personal information from motor vehicle records 

interferes with the ability of the press to gather the news. As 

an initial matter, it is important to note that the First 

Amendment provides no special solicitude for members of 

the press. Although the Supreme Court has commented that 

“news gathering is not without its First Amendment protections,” Branzburg v. Hayes, 408 U.S. 665, 707 (1972), it has repeatedly declined to confer on the media an expansive right 

to gather information, concluding that such an approach 

would “present practical and conceptual difficulties of a 

high order.” Id. at 703–04. Rather, the Court has held that the 

First Amendment “does not guarantee the press a constitutional right of special access to information not available to 

the public generally,” Pell v. Procunier, 417 U.S. 817, 833 

(1974) (quoting Branzburg, 408 U.S. at 684), and has further 

stated that “generally applicable laws do not offend the First 

Amendment simply because their enforcement against the 

press has incidental effects on its ability to gather and report 

the news.” Cohen v. Cowles Media Co., 501 U.S. 663, 669 (1991).

We conclude that Sun-Times has not alleged a cognizable 

First Amendment injury with respect to the DPPA’s prohibition on obtaining information from driving records—a 

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limitation only on access to information. In Travis v. Reno, we 

rejected a facial challenge to the DPPA and noted that 

“[p]eering into public records is not part of the ‘freedom of 

speech’ that the first amendment protects. ‘There is no constitutional right to have access to particular government information, or to require openness from the bureaucracy.’” 

163 F.3d 1000, 1007 (7th Cir. 1998) (quoting Houchins v. 

KQED, Inc., 438 U.S. 1, 14 (1978) (plurality opinion)). This 

position accords with the Supreme Court’s holding that 

“there is no constitutional right to obtain all the information 

provided by FOIA laws.” McBurney v. Young, 133 S. Ct. 1709, 

1718 (2013); see also L.A. Police Dep’t v. United Reporting Publ’g 

Corp., 528 U.S. 32, 34, 40 (1999) (noting, in analyzing a state 

statute that placed conditions on public access to arrestees’ 

addresses, “California could decide not to give out arrestee 

information at all without violating the First Amendment”). 

Numerous federal statutes, including, for instance, the Privacy Act of 1974, 5 U.S.C. § 552a, limit public access to sensitive information,8 and the constitutionality of those limitations is widely accepted. See Travis, 163 F.3d at 1007 (“No 

one thinks that the Privacy Act violates the first amendment. 

Well, maybe these plaintiffs do think this, but the position is 

untenable.”).

8 5 U.S.C. § 552a(b) mandates, “No [federal] agency shall disclose any 

record which is contained in a system of records by any means of communication to any person, or to another agency, except pursuant to a 

written request by, or with the prior written consent of, the individual to 

whom the record pertains,” subject to limited exceptions not relevant 

here. Although the Privacy Act restricts the ability of federal agencies to 

disclose information rather than the ability of individuals to collect information, the effect on the press’s ability to gather the news is the same. 

 

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It is true that the Supreme Court has recognized a limited 

right of access to certain governmental proceedings, specifically those related to the judicial process. See, e.g., Globe 

Newspaper Co. v. Superior Court, 457 U.S. 596, 605–06 (1982) 

(recognizing a constitutional—though not absolute—right of 

public access to criminal trials); Press-Enter. Co. v. Superior

Court, 478 U.S. 1, 10 (1986) (extending to preliminary hearings the qualified First Amendment right of access to criminal trials acknowledged in Globe). Yet in Globe Newspaper Co.

v. Superior Court, which held that a statute excluding the 

public from criminal trials during the testimony of minor 

sexual assault victims failed to withstand strict scrutiny, the 

Court emphasized that the right of access to criminal trials is 

rooted in the access that the public and press historically enjoyed to such proceedings, which led to a presumption of 

openness. 457 U.S. at 605. The Court further explained that 

“public access to criminal trials permits the public to participate in and serve as a check upon the judicial process—an 

essential component in our structure of self-government.” Id.

at 606. There is no corresponding need for public participation in the maintenance of driving records, which can hardly 

be described as an “essential component” of selfgovernment.

Sun-Times argues that, although on its face the DPPA is 

aimed at limiting access to motor vehicle records at the outset, the statute was nevertheless enacted to suppress 

speech—albeit at an earlier point in the speech process. See 

Citizens United v. FEC, 558 U.S. 310, 336 (2010) (“Laws enacted to control or suppress speech may operate at different 

points in the speech process.”). The DPPA, according to SunTimes, restricts speech because it restricts the news media’s 

ability to gather and report the news. Sun-Times looks 

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No. 14-2295 19

primarily to our opinion in American Civil Liberties Union of 

Illinois v. Alvarez (“ACLU”), 679 F.3d 583 (7th Cir. 2012), to 

support its contention. In ACLU, we held that an Illinois

statute prohibiting individuals from making audio recordings of police officers performing their duties in public triggered heightened First Amendment scrutiny and likely violated the First Amendment under either intermediate or 

strict scrutiny. Id. at 586–87. We emphasized that although 

the statute prohibited the making of the recording rather than

the core free speech right to disseminate the resulting recording, the statute nevertheless burdened speech. Id. at 595. We 

concluded that “[t]he right to publish or broadcast an audio 

or audiovisual recording would be insecure, or largely ineffective, if the antecedent act of making the recording is wholly unprotected.” Id. Sun-Times contends that our reasoning 

in ACLU indicates that although the DPPA does not prevent 

Sun-Times from publishing personal information obtained 

through lawful means, the Act’s ban on the acquisition of 

personal information from an individual’s motor vehicle 

record amounts to an unconstitutional burden on speech.

However, ACLU is distinguishable on several grounds. 

While the Illinois eavesdropping statute’s effect on First 

Amendment interests was “far from incidental” because it 

banned “all audio recording of any oral communication,” id.

at 595, 602, the same is not true of the DPPA’s prohibition on 

the acquisition of personal information from a single, isolated source. It can hardly be said that this targeted restriction 

renders Sun-Times’s right to publish the truthful information at issue here—much of which can be gathered from 

physical observation of the Officers or from other lawful 

sources (including, of course, a state FOIA request)—

“largely ineffective.” Further, in forbidding only the act of 

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20 No. 14-2295

peering into an individual’s personal government records, 

the DPPA protects privacy concerns not present in ACLU. If 

a member of the press observed one of the Officers in public—for example, during a traffic stop—he could publish any 

information gleaned from that interaction without offending 

the DPPA. By contrast, the Illinois eavesdropping statute 

operated as a total ban on recording police officers’ activities, even when they were “performing their duties in public 

places and speaking at a volume audible to bystanders.” Id.

at 605.

The nature of the restricted form of expression also figured prominently in our ACLU analysis. We noted that 

“[a]udio and audiovisual recording are media of expression 

commonly used for the preservation and dissemination of 

information and ideas and thus are included within the free 

speech and free press guaranty of the First and Fourteenth 

Amendments.” Id. at 595 (citation and internal quotation 

marks omitted). We also identified photography, notetaking, and the posting of signs as other common media of

expression. Id. at 595–96. Yet while the eavesdropping statute “restrict[ed] the use of a common, indeed ubiquitous, instrument of communication,” id. at 596 (emphasis added), the 

act of harvesting information from driving records is hardly 

such an instrument. We are therefore unpersuaded by SunTimes’s attempt to analogize a total ban on recording police 

officers’ actions in public to the DPPA’s effort to maintain 

the privacy of personal information contained in an individual’s driving record.

For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that the DPPA’s 

prohibition on knowingly obtaining an individual’s personal 

information from motor vehicle records does not trigger

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No. 14-2295 21

heightened First Amendment scrutiny and instead requires 

only rational basis review. See Wis. Educ. Ass’n Council v. 

Walker, 705 F.3d 640, 652–53, 657 n.12 (7th Cir. 2013) (explaining that a regulation that does not prompt First 

Amendment scrutiny is properly subjected to rational basis 

review, “the residual level of scrutiny that courts apply to all 

laws not involving a suspect class or infringing a fundamental right”). Because limiting public access to driving records 

is rationally related to the government’s legitimate interest 

in preventing “stalkers and criminals [from] acquir[ing] personal information from state DMVs,” the restriction easily 

satisfies the deferential rational basis standard. Maracich, 133 

S. Ct. at 2198; see also Wis. Educ. Ass’n Council, 705 F.3d at 653 

(setting forth the rational basis test).

2. The DPPA’s Prohibition on Disclosing Personal Information

Because the DPPA restricts the collection of personal information from driving records irrespective of whether that 

information is subsequently disclosed, and because we have 

determined that this restriction does not violate the First 

Amendment, Sun-Times’s acquisition of the Officers’ personal information is sufficient to establish an actionable violation of the statute. See 18 U.S.C. § 2724 (providing a private 

right of action and a damages award not less than $2,500 in 

liquidated damages against anyone who “knowingly obtains 

... personal information[] from a motor vehicle record”). Yet, 

because Sun-Times has also been accused of violating the 

DPPA by publishing the Officers’ personal information, we 

must independently consider whether the Act’s prohibition 

on such publication violates the First Amendment. 

Although we have established that the DPPA’s limitation 

on obtaining personal information is not a restriction on 

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speech at all, the Act’s prohibition on disclosing that information is a direct regulation of speech. As the Supreme 

Court has noted, “If the acts of ‘disclosing’ and ‘publishing’ 

information do not constitute speech, it is hard to imagine 

what does fall within that category ... .” Bartnicki v. Vopper, 

532 U.S. 514, 527 (2001) (citation and internal quotation 

marks omitted). The appropriate standard of review for such 

a regulation hinges on whether the regulation is content 

based, which requires us to apply strict scrutiny, or content 

neutral, which demands only an intermediate level of scrutiny “because in most cases the[se regulations] pose a less 

substantial risk of excising certain ideas or viewpoints from 

the public dialogue.” Turner Broad. Sys., Inc. v. FCC, 512 U.S. 

622, 642 (1994). 

The DPPA proscribes only the publication of personal information that has been obtained from motor vehicle records. The origin of the information is thus crucial to the illegality of its publication—the statute is agnostic to the dissemination of the very same information acquired from a 

lawful source. The Supreme Court has concluded that disclosures that are prohibited “by virtue of the source, rather 

than the subject matter” are easily categorized as content 

neutral. Bartnicki, 532 U.S. at 526 (designating as content

neutral a federal statute forbidding disclosure of the contents

of unlawfully intercepted wire, electronic, or oral communications). The DPPA, of course, presents a hybrid situation—

in which the illegality of a disclosure is determined by a 

combination of source (motor vehicle records) and subject 

matter (personally identifiable information)—which therefore does not conclusively answer the content neutrality inquiry. However, because the Act permits publication of 

identical information so long as that information flows from 

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No. 14-2295 23

a source other than driving records, it “implicates the First 

Amendment rights of the restricted party to a far lesser extent than would restraints on dissemination of information 

in a different context.” Seattle Times Co. v. Rhinehart, 467 U.S. 

20, 34 (1984) (concluding that a protective order allowing a 

party to “disseminate the identical information covered by 

the ... order as long as the information [wa]s gained through 

means independent of the court’s processes” did not offend 

the First Amendment).

“[T]he principal inquiry in determining content neutrality ... is whether the government has adopted a regulation of 

speech because of [agreement or] disagreement with the 

message it conveys.” ACLU, 679 F.3d at 603 (alterations in 

original) (quoting Turner Broad. Sys., 512 U.S. at 642). Congress crafted the DPPA’s limitation on disclosure of personal 

information not because it disagreed with the message 

communicated by drivers’ personal details, but in order to 

keep individuals’ identifying information out of the hands of 

potential stalkers. And, although the DPPA exempts select 

uses from its ban on disclosure, see 18 U.S.C. § 2721(b), these 

exceptions are not premised on a preference for one category 

of speech over another; rather, they permit disclosure under

those limited circumstances in which Congress deemed the 

public safety risk to be minimal.9 Therefore, while the 

9 The “permissible uses” listed in § 2721(b) generally relate to operation 

of motor vehicles (§ 2721(b)(2), (7), (9), (10), (14)); insurance coverage 

(§ 2721(b)(6)); and use by government or security entities, or in legal proceedings (§ 2721(b)(1), (4), (8)). All other permissible uses require the express consent of the individual whose personal information is at issue

(§ 2721(b)(11)–(13)), or contain safeguards to prevent intrusions on privacy. See § 2721(b)(3) (permitting verification only of personal information

 

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DPPA’s “permissible use” exceptions may have “an incidental effect on some speakers or messages but not others,” 

we nonetheless conclude that the DPPA is content neutral 

because its public safety goals are “unrelated to the content 

of [the regulated] expression.” Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 

491 U.S. 781, 791 (1989).

The Supreme Court has established that “if a newspaper 

lawfully obtains truthful information about a matter of public significance then state officials may not constitutionally 

punish publication of the information, absent a need to further a state interest of the highest order.” Smith v. Daily Mail 

Publ’g Co., 443 U.S. 97, 103 (1979); see also Fla. Star v. B.J.F., 

491 U.S. 524, 533 (1989). Sun-Times, however, cites no authority for the proposition that an entity that acquires information by breaking the law enjoys a First Amendment right 

to disseminate that information. Instead, all of the many cases on which Sun-Times relies involve scenarios where the 

press’s initial acquisition of sensitive information was lawful.

In Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co., staff of a local newspaper released the name of a suspected juvenile shooter after 

learning his identity from witness interviews at the scene of 

the homicide. 443 U.S. at 99. This disclosure violated a West 

Virginia statute prohibiting the press from publishing, without court approval, the name of any youth charged as a juvenile offender. Id. at 98. Crucial to the Supreme Court’s 

holding that the statute violated the First Amendment was 

the fact that the press had lawfully obtained the suspect’s 

submitted by the individual himself); § 2721(b)(5) (allowing use of personal information in research activities but prohibiting publication).

 

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No. 14-2295 25

name. See id. at 105 (“Our holding in this case is narrow. 

There is no issue before us of unlawful press access to confidential judicial proceedings ... .”). The Court faced a similar 

scenario in Florida Star v. B.J.F.: a newspaper’s publication—

in violation of a Florida statute—of a rape victim’s name, 

which the paper obtained from a public police report. 491 

U.S. at 526. Once again, the lawfulness of the press’s acquisition of the victim’s name proved material to the Court’s invalidation of the statute on First Amendment grounds. See 

id. at 536 (“[A]ssuming the Constitution permitted a State to 

proscribe receipt of information, Florida has not taken this

step.”). Even in Bartnicki v. Vopper—where a divided Supreme Court held that the First Amendment protected the 

publication of an illegally intercepted cellular telephone conversation—the unlawful interception and recording were 

perpetrated by an unknown third party who then transmitted the recording to the media. See 532 U.S. at 535 (concluding that “a stranger’s illegal conduct does not suffice to remove the First Amendment shield from speech about a matter of public concern”).10 Although in Bartnicki the press had 

reason to know that the initial interception was unlawful, 

10 In Bartnicki, an unidentified individual illegally intercepted and recorded a telephone call between the president of a local teachers’ union 

and the union’s chief negotiator, which addressed the status of collective 

bargaining negotiations between the union and the school board. At one 

point in the conversation, the president commented that if the school 

board would not accommodate a raise of at least three percent, “we’re 

gonna have to go to their, their homes ... . To blow off their front porches, we’ll have to do some work on some of those guys.” 532 U.S. at 518–

19.

 

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the press’s “access to the information ... was obtained lawfully.” Id. at 517–18, 525.

Sun-Times fares no better in its invocation of precedent 

from this circuit. Sun-Times points to our opinion in Thomas 

v. Pearl, 998 F.2d 447, 449 (7th Cir. 1993), in which a college 

basketball coach secretly taped conversations with a player 

about illegal perks offered by a rival university, as an example of what Sun-Times terms “theoretically unlawful newsgathering techniques inherent to successful journalism.” Yet 

in Thomas, we determined that the coach lacked the requisite 

intent to be found in violation of federal wiretapping laws, 

id. at 452–53, and thus had not unlawfully obtained the information at issue. Sun-Times also cites Desnick v. American 

Broadcasting Cos., 44 F.3d 1345, 1355 (7th Cir. 1995), for the 

proposition that the First Amendment protects a broadcaster’s “surreptitious, confrontational, unscrupulous and ungentlemanly” investigatory tactics. But Desnick’s ruling applies only insofar as “no established rights are invaded in the 

process.” Id. Here, of course, Sun-Times’s acquisition of the 

Officers’ personal information invaded their established 

rights under the DPPA. This is a crucial distinction. Although Sun-Times claims that, in acquiring and disclosing 

truthful information, it engaged only in “perfectly routine, 

traditional journalism,” it cannot escape the fact that it acquired that truthful information unlawfully.

Given this distinction, we enter uncharted territory in our 

analysis of what the Supreme Court has identified as a “stillopen question”—that is, “whether, in cases where information has been acquired unlawfully by a newspaper[,] ...

government may ever punish not only the unlawful acquisition, but the ensuing publication as well.” Bartnicki, 532 U.S. 

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No. 14-2295 27

at 528 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). As a 

content-neutral regulation, § 2722(a)’s limitation on disclosure will withstand First Amendment scrutiny if it “furthers 

an important or substantial governmental interest; if the 

governmental interest is unrelated to the suppression of free 

expression; and if the incidental restriction on alleged First 

Amendment freedoms is no greater than is essential to the 

furtherance of that interest.” Turner Broad. Sys., 512 U.S. at 

662 (quoting United States v. O’Brien, 391 U.S. 367, 377 

(1968)).

The DPPA’s prohibition on disclosing individuals’ personally identifiable information—separate and apart from its 

ban on obtaining that information—advances two government interests, both of which relate to the Act’s underlying 

public safety goals: first, the interest in removing an incentive for parties to unlawfully obtain personal information in 

the first instance; and second, the interest in minimizing the 

harm to individuals whose personal information has been 

illegally obtained. Analyzing similar asserted interests with 

respect to a federal ban on the disclosure of illegally intercepted cellular telephone conversations, the Bartnicki Court

“assume[d] that those interests adequately justify the [statute’s] prohibition ... against the interceptor’s own use of information that he or she acquired by violating [the statute].” 

532 U.S. at 529. 

In evaluating the proffered interest in deterrence, however, the Bartnicki Court was unwilling to accept the government’s contention that a ban on disclosure by individuals 

who lawfully came into possession of intercepted communications would meaningfully discourage the initial unlawful 

interception by a third party. See id. (“The normal method of 

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28 No. 14-2295

deterring unlawful conduct is to impose an appropriate punishment on the person who engages in it.”). The Court found 

“no basis for assuming that imposing sanctions upon [publishers of information] will deter the [unlawful interceptor of 

that information] from continuing to engage in surreptitious 

interceptions.” Id. at 531. We would face an analogous scenario if a third party had obtained personal information in 

violation of the DPPA and transmitted that information to 

Sun-Times, who subsequently published it. But that is not 

our case. Here, there is no intervening illegal actor: SunTimes itself unlawfully sought and acquired the Officers’ 

personal information from the Secretary of State, and proceeded to publish it. Where the acquirer and publisher are 

one and the same, a prohibition on the publication of sensitive information operates as an effective deterrent against 

the initial unlawful acquisition of that same information. 

Such acquisition carries little benefit independent of the 

right to disseminate that information to a broader audience. 

We therefore conclude that the government’s deterrence interest is both important and likely to be advanced by the 

DPPA’s ban on Sun-Times’s disclosure of the Officers’ personal information.

The Supreme Court has also recognized the importance 

of the government’s second asserted interest—protecting the 

privacy of individuals whose personal information has been 

illegally obtained. The Bartnicki Court

acknowledge[d] that some intrusions on privacy are more offensive than others, and that the

disclosure of the contents of ... private [information] can be an even greater intrusion on 

privacy than the interception itself. As a result, 

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No. 14-2295 29

there is a valid independent justification for 

prohibiting such disclosures by persons who 

lawfully obtained access to the contents of an 

illegally intercepted message, even if that prohibition does not play a significant role in preventing such interceptions from occurring in 

the first place.

Id. at 533. Where, as here, a prohibition on disclosure does

play a significant role in deterring the initial unlawful interception of sensitive information—and also where the party 

facing disclosure restrictions did not lawfully obtain the information at issue—the argument in support of prohibition 

becomes even stronger. Yet while the Bartnicki Court recognized the substantial state interest in privacy protection, it 

nevertheless determined that, under the applicable facts, 

“privacy concerns give way when balanced against the interest in publishing matters of public importance.” Id. at 534.

We conclude, however, that the balance in the instant 

case tips in the opposite direction. Although the Sun-Times

article relates to a matter of public significance—the allegation that the Chicago Police Department manipulated a 

homicide investigation—the specific details at issue are 

largely cumulative of lawfully obtained information published in that very same article, and are therefore of less 

pressing public concern than the threats of physical violence 

in Bartnicki. See id. at 536 (Breyer, J., concurring) (noting that 

the intercepted conversation presented a “matter of unusual 

public concern”). While Sun-Times provided details of the 

Officers’ physical traits to highlight the resemblance between the “fillers” and Vanecko, most of the article’s editorial force was achieved through publication of the lineup

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photographs that Sun-Times obtained through its FOIA request—the value added by the inclusion of the Officers’ personal information was negligible. Each Officer’s height is evident from the lineup photographs, while their weights and 

ages are relevant only to the extent that they increase the Officers’ resemblance to Vanecko—a resemblance that the photographs independently convey. And, although identifying 

the Officers’ hair and eye colors may add some detail to the 

published black-and-white photographs, their personal information is largely redundant of what the public could easily observe from the photographs themselves. Therefore, 

Sun-Times’s publication of the Officers’ personal details both 

intruded on their privacy and threatened their safety, while 

doing little to advance Sun-Times’s reporting on a story of 

public concern. Certainly, in context, the significance of the 

Officers’ personal information does not rise to the level of 

the threats of physical violence at issue in Bartnicki,11 and 

11 Justice Breyer, joined by Justice O’Connor, concurred in the Bartnicki 

Court’s 6–3 decision in favor of publication, but emphasized that he did 

so based on the unique circumstances of the case—that is, where “the 

speakers’ legitimate privacy expectations are unusually low, and the 

public interest in defeating those expectations is unusually high.” 532 

U.S. at 540 (Breyer, J., concurring). Justice Breyer stressed that “in finding 

a constitutional privilege to publish unlawfully intercepted conversations of the kind here at issue, the Court does not create a ‘public interest’ exception that swallows up the [federal wiretapping] statutes’ privacy-protecting general rule. Rather, it finds constitutional protection for 

publication of intercepted information of a special kind.” Id. He noted 

that although he agreed with the Court’s holding, he “would not extend 

that holding beyond these present circumstances.” Id. at 541. Because the 

Officers’ privacy expectations in their personal information are significantly greater—and the public value of that information is significantly 

lesser—than in Bartnicki, a ruling in Sun-Times’s favor would represent a 

 

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No. 14-2295 31

therefore does not override the government’s substantial interest in privacy protection. In sum, we conclude with respect to the first prong of the intermediate scrutiny analysis,

that the government’s asserted interests are both important 

and furthered by the DPPA’s prohibition on disclosure. 

As for the second prong of the analysis, both of the government’s interests—(1) deterring the initial illegal acquisition of personal information, and (2) protecting the privacy 

of individuals whose information has been illegally obtained—are unrelated to the suppression of free expression 

and instead relate to the promotion of public safety. Finally, 

we inquire whether § 2722(a) is narrowly tailored such that 

it encroaches upon First Amendment freedoms only to the 

extent necessary to further those government interests. 

Turner Broad. Sys., 512 U.S. at 662. The Supreme Court has 

provided helpful guidance with respect to the application of 

this third and final prong of the intermediate scrutiny analysis:

To satisfy this standard, a regulation need not 

be the least speech-restrictive means of advancing the Government’s interests. “Rather, the 

requirement of narrow tailoring is satisfied so 

long as the ... regulation promotes a substantial government interest that would be 

achieved less effectively absent the regulation.” 

Narrow tailoring in this context requires, in 

other words, that the means chosen do not 

substantial extension of Bartnicki’s “narrow holding,” id. at 536—separate 

and apart from the other distinguishing features of the instant case.

 

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“burden substantially more speech than is necessary to further the government’s legitimate 

interests.” 

Id. (alteration in original) (quoting Ward, 491 U.S. at 799)

(some internal quotation marks omitted).

The DPPA’s disclosure prohibition contains several safeguards characteristic of narrow tailoring: it is content neutral, it permits publication of the same information gathered 

from lawful sources, it imposes no special burden upon the 

media, and it has a scienter requirement (“knowingly”) to 

provide fair warning to potential offenders. See Bartnicki, 532 

U.S. at 548 (Rehnquist, C.J., dissenting) (cataloguing the distinguishing features of narrowly tailored regulations). The 

prohibition also contains fourteen “permissible use” exceptions, which permit disclosure under those circumstances 

deemed unlikely to threaten an individual’s personal safety.

See 18 U.S.C. § 2721(b); see also supra note 9. Given these features, we conclude that § 2722(a) does not burden substantially more speech than necessary to further the government’s legitimate interests, Ward, 491 U.S. at 799, and therefore withstands intermediate scrutiny.

For these reasons, we conclude that the DPPA’s prohibition on disclosing the Officers’ personal information does 

not violate Sun-Times’s First Amendment rights. As this is 

an as-applied challenge, our holding is limited to the facts 

and circumstances of this case. We do not opine as to whether, given a scenario involving lesser privacy concerns or information of greater public significance, the delicate balance 

might tip in favor of disclosure. We hold only that, where 

members of the press unlawfully obtain sensitive information

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that, in context, is of marginal public value, the First 

Amendment does not guarantee them the right to publish 

that information. The district court therefore did not err in 

denying Sun-Times’s motion to dismiss the Officers’ claim 

that Sun-Times violated their rights under the DPPA.

III. Conclusion

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

denial of Sun-Times’s motion to dismiss and REMAND for 

further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

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