Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-12-05137/USCOURTS-caDC-12-05137-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Central Intelligence Agency
Appellee
Judicial Watch, Inc.
Appellant
United States Department of Defense
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued January 10, 2013 Decided May 21, 2013

No. 12-5137

JUDICIAL WATCH, INC.,

APPELLANT

v.

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE AND CENTRAL

INTELLIGENCE AGENCY,

APPELLEES

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:11-cv-00890)

Michael Bekesha argued the cause and filed the briefs for

appellant. Paul J. Orfanedes and James F. Peterson entered

appearances. 

Robert M. Loeb, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice,

argued the cause for appellees. With him on the brief were

Stuart Delery, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General,

Ronald C. Machen Jr., U.S. Attorney, and Matthew Collette,

Attorney.

Before: GARLAND, Chief Judge, ROGERS, Circuit Judge,

and EDWARDS, Senior Circuit Judge.

USCA Case #12-5137 Document #1437137 Filed: 05/21/2013 Page 1 of 14
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Opinion for the Court filed PER CURIAM.

PER CURIAM: Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of

Information Act request seeking disclosure by the Central

Intelligence Agency of 52 post-mortem images of Osama bin

Laden. The agency refused on the ground that the images were

classified Top Secret. Judicial Watch sued, and the district court

granted summary judgment for the agency. We affirm because

the images were properly classified and hence are exempt from

disclosure under the Act.

I

On May 1, 2011, President Obama announced that

American personnel had killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin

Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan and buried his body at sea. 

Shortly thereafter, Judicial Watch filed Freedom of Information

Act (FOIA) requests with the Department of Defense and the

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) seeking any photographs or

videos depicting bin Laden “during and/or after the U.S. military

operation in Pakistan.” The Defense Department responded that

it had no such images. The CIA acknowledged that it had 52

responsive records, but said that it intended to withhold them

because they were classified Top Secret.1

 Judicial Watch sued,

and the parties filed cross-motions for summary judgment.

1

After oral argument on this appeal, the CIA acknowledged that

it had located seven additional responsive records, which it withheld

on the same basis as the original 52 images. See Rule 28(j) Letter

from CIA Counsel (filed Feb. 15, 2013).

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The Government supported its motion with three

declarations that are relevant on appeal.2

 The first, a lengthy

declaration by John Bennett, Director of the CIA’s National

Clandestine Service, stated that all 52 responsive records

contained “post-mortem images of [bin Laden’s] body.” 

Bennett Decl. ¶ 11. Many, he said, were “quite graphic” and

“gruesome” pictures displaying the bullet wound that killed bin

Laden; some showed bin Laden’s face in a way intended to

enable facial recognition analysis; and some documented the

transportation and burial of bin Laden’s corpse. Id. Bennett

attested that he had personally reviewed each image and

concluded that all of them were properly classified Top Secret

because, if disclosed, they could be expected to lead to

retaliatory attacks against Americans and aid the production of

anti-American propaganda. Id. ¶¶ 4, 12, 23. Bennett analogized

the bin Laden images to post-mortem photographs of al Qaeda

leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, which had been portrayed in

Pakistan as an “ad for jihad,” id. ¶ 26, and to images of abuse at

Abu Ghraib prison, which had been used “very effective[ly]” by

al Qaeda to recruit supporters and raise funds, id. ¶ 24. He said

that al Qaeda had already produced propaganda relating to bin

Laden’s death, and that its new leader had questioned whether

bin Laden had in fact received a proper burial at sea. Id. ¶ 25. 

Bennett also noted that a subset of the records, including those

used to conduct facial recognition analysis, could enable foreign

intelligence services to infer certain CIA intelligence techniques. 

Id. ¶ 29.

Lieutenant General Robert Neller, the Director of

Operations, J-3, on the Joint Staff at the Pentagon, affirmed that

2

A fourth declaration, filed by William Kammer, Chief of the

Department of Defense’s Freedom of Information Division, attested

that the Pentagon possessed no responsive records. Judicial Watch no

longer contests this point.

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he, too, had personally reviewed the images. See Neller Decl.

¶ 2. Like Bennett, Neller believed that their release would “pose

a clear and grave risk of inciting violence and riots against U.S.

and Coalition forces,” and “expose innocent Afghan and

American civilians to harm.” Id. ¶ 6. Neller cited the fatal riots

that had followed both the publication of a Danish cartoon of the

Prophet Muhammad and an erroneous report that American

soldiers had desecrated the Koran. Id. ¶¶ 7-8. Neller believed

that a similar violent reaction could be expected to follow the

release of the bin Laden images. Id. ¶ 9.

Admiral William McRaven, Commander of the United

States Special Operations Command, submitted a third, partially

classified declaration.3

 In the non-classified portions of the

declaration, McRaven attested, again on the basis of first-hand

review, that disclosure of some of the images would enable

identification of the special operations unit that participated in

the Abbottabad operation, thereby exposing its members and

their families to great risk of harm. McRaven Decl. ¶ 5. He

explained that other images would reveal classified methods and

tactics used in U.S. special operations. Id. ¶ 6. As a result, he

believed release “could reasonably be expected to cause harm to

the national security.” Id. ¶ 8.

In its cross-motion for summary judgment, Judicial Watch

argued that the CIA’s declarations failed to demonstrate either

substantive or procedural compliance with the criteria for

classification. With respect to the latter, Judicial Watch argued

that the declarations failed to identify the “original classification

authority” who had classified the records, or to attest that the

records had been properly marked. The CIA responded by filing

3

The CIA filed an unredacted version of the McRaven declaration

ex parte. We do not rely on the classified portions of the declaration

in this opinion.

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a fourth declaration, written by Elizabeth Culver, the

Information Review Officer for the CIA’s National Clandestine

Service. Culver explained that the images had initially been

“derivatively classified” by a CIA official in accordance with

the criteria set out in a classification guide written by the CIA’s

Director of Information Management. Culver Decl. ¶ 8. At the

time Director Bennett had filed his declaration, the records each

contained the marking “Top Secret.” Id. ¶ 7. Since then, “out

of an abundance of caution,” other markings had been added to

the records, including the identity of the derivative classifier,

citations to the classification guide and the reasons for

classification, and the applicable declassification instructions. 

Id. Culver said she had confirmed, after personally reviewing

the records, that each now contained all the required

classification markings. Id.

On the basis of these declarations, the district court

concluded that the CIA had sustained its burden of showing that

the images of bin Laden satisfied the substantive and procedural

criteria for classification. See Judicial Watch, Inc. v. U.S. Dep’t

of Def., 857 F. Supp. 2d 44, 52 (D.D.C. 2012). The CIA’s

declarations, the court said, gave a “plausible” and “logical”

account of the harm to national security that might result from

the release of these images. Id. at 63. While the record left

uncertain whether the images had been classified according to

proper procedures at the time Judicial Watch made its FOIA

request, the court said the declarations submitted by Bennett and

Culver demonstrated that the agency had since remedied

whatever procedural defects might have existed. Id. at 57-58.

Accordingly, the court held that the CIA had properly withheld

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these records under FOIA Exemption 1.4

 Id. at 63-64. Judicial

Watch appealed.

II

FOIA requires agencies to disclose records on request

unless one of nine exemptions applies. See Milner v. Dep’t of

the Navy, 131 S. Ct. 1259, 1262 (2011). Exemption 1, which the

CIA invokes in this case, permits agencies to withhold records

that 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). 

Agencies may establish the applicability of Exemption 1 by

affidavit (or declaration). See ACLU v. U.S. Dep’t of Def., 628

F.3d 612, 619 (D.C. Cir. 2011). We accord such an affidavit

“substantial weight”: so long as it “describes the justifications

for withholding the information with specific detail,

demonstrates that the information withheld logically falls within

the claimed exemption, and is not contradicted by contrary

evidence in the record or by evidence of the agency’s bad faith,

. . . summary judgment is warranted on the basis of the affidavit

alone.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted); see Larson v.

Dep’t of State, 565 F.3d 857, 862 (D.C. Cir. 2009); Wolf v. CIA,

473 F.3d 370, 374-75 (D.C. Cir. 2007); Miller v. Casey, 730

F.2d 773, 776 (D.C. Cir. 1984). “Ultimately, an agency's

justification for invoking a FOIA exemption is sufficient if it

appears ‘logical’ or ‘plausible.’” ACLU, 628 F.3d at 619

(quoting Larson, 565 F.3d at 862 (quoting Wolf, 473 F.3d at

374–75)).

4

The district court did not address the agency’s alternative

argument that some of the images could be withheld under FOIA

Exemption 3. See Judicial Watch, 857 F. Supp. 2d at 55; 5 U.S.C.

§ 552(b)(3). We also do not reach that question.

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Executive Order No. 13,526, 75 Fed. Reg. 707 (Dec. 29,

2009), the operative classification order under Exemption 1, sets

forth both substantive and procedural criteria for classification. 

See, e.g., Lesar v. U.S. Dep’t of Justice, 636 F.2d 472, 481 (D.C.

Cir. 1980) (explaining that the Executive Order’s substantive

and procedural criteria must be satisfied for an agency to

properly invoke Exemption 1); H.R. REP. NO. 93-1380, at 228-

29 (1974) (same). The Order’s substantive criteria, as relevant

here, are twofold. First, classified information must pertain to

at least one of eight subject-matter classification categories. See

Exec. Order No. 13,526, §§ 1.1(a)(3), 1.4. Second, disclosure

of that information must reasonably be expected to cause some

degree of harm to national security -- in the case of Top Secret

information, “exceptionally grave” harm -- that is identifiable or

describable. See id. §§ 1.1(a)(4), 1.2(a)(1), 1.4. The Order also

establishes two pertinent procedural requirements. Information

may be classified only by an individual with original or

derivative classification authority. See id. §§ 1.1(a)(1), 2.1. 

And classified documents must be marked with several pieces

of information, including the identity of the classifier and

instructions for declassification. See id. §§ 1.6, 2.1(b). 

 Judicial Watch raises both substantive and procedural

challenges to the CIA’s classification decision. We consider

each in turn.

A

Turning first to the substantive question, it is indisputable

that the images at issue fall within the Executive Order’s

subject-matter limits. At least some of the images “pertain[] to

. . . intelligence activities (including covert action), [or]

intelligence sources or methods,” Exec. Order No. 13,526,

§ 1.4(c), and all 52 images plainly “pertain[] to . . . foreign

activities of the United States,” id. § 1.4(d). As the district court

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observed, “pertains” is “not a very demanding verb.” Judicial

Watch, 857 F. Supp. 2d at 60. And every image at issue

documents events involving American military personnel

thousands of miles outside of American territory.

There is also no doubt that the declarations of Director

Bennett and Admiral McRaven establish the requisite level of

harm -- the second substantive limit on classification -- for a

great many of the images. The photographs used to conduct

facial recognition analysis could reasonably be expected to

reveal classified intelligence methods. See Bennett Decl. ¶ 29;

Judicial Watch Br. 12-13 (conceding the point). The images

displaying members of the special operations unit that conducted

the raid could reasonably be expected to endanger those

personnel. See McRaven Decl. ¶¶ 3, 5. These are valid grounds

for classification under our precedents. See, e.g., Miller, 730

F.2d at 775-77; Halperin v. CIA, 629 F.2d 144, 148-50 (D.C.

Cir. 1980). Furthermore, Judicial Watch does not appear to

seriously question the CIA’s contention that the most “graphic”

and “gruesome” of the remaining images -- those displaying the

bullet wound to bin Laden’s head -- merit classification because

of the danger that their release would lead to violence against

American interests. See Judicial Watch Reply Br. 2, 8-9. In any

event, the rationale for withholding less graphic and gruesome

images of bin Laden (discussed below) would apply a fortiori to

these images.

Judicial Watch correctly focuses instead on the most

seemingly innocuous of the images: those that depict “the

preparation of [bin Laden’s] body for burial” and “the burial

itself,” Bennett Decl. ¶ 11. See Judicial Watch Reply Br. 1. 

Judicial Watch contends it is unlikely that the disclosure of those

images would cause any damage, let alone exceptionally grave

damage, to U.S. national security. It argues that al Qaeda and its

affiliates “do not need a specific reason to incite violence,” and

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that any claim that individuals would engage in violence upon

seeing such images is mere speculation. Judicial Watch Br. 23-

24.

As the district court rightly concluded, however, the CIA’s

declarations give reason to believe that releasing images of

American military personnel burying the founder and leader of

al Qaeda could cause exceptionally grave harm. See Judicial

Watch, 857 F. Supp. 2d at 62. General Neller’s declaration

describes prior instances in which reasonably analogous

disclosures have led to widespread and fatal violence in the

Middle East, some of it directed at U.S. interests. The

publication of a Danish cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad led

to hundreds of injuries and deaths, as well as to an attack on a

U.S. airbase in Afghanistan. See Neller Decl. ¶ 8. Likewise, an

erroneous article in Newsweek, alleging that American soldiers

had desecrated the Koran, led to eleven deaths and many injuries

during protests against the United States in Afghanistan and

Egypt. Id. ¶ 7. Director Bennett’s declaration gives plausible

reason to believe that a comparable reaction would follow the

release of post-mortem images of bin Laden, “including images

of his burial.” Bennett Decl. ¶ 27. Bennett explains that al

Qaeda has already devoted attention to the “so-called

‘martyrdom’” of bin Laden and has specifically “attacked the

United States’ assertions that [he] received an appropriate

Islamic burial at sea.” Id. ¶ 25. Bennett also notes that releasing

the images of the burial at sea “could be interpreted as a

deliberate attempt by the United States to humiliate” bin Laden. 

Id. ¶ 27. Together, these declarations support their declarants’

determinations that releasing any of the images, including the

burial images, could reasonably be expected to trigger violence

and attacks “against United States interests, personnel, and

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citizens worldwide.” Neller Decl. ¶ 9; see id. ¶ 6; Bennett Decl.

¶¶ 25, 27.5

Judicial Watch protests that the government’s declarations

show nothing more than that release of the images may cause

“some individuals who do not like the United States” to commit

violence overseas, and that the courts should not succumb to this

kind of blackmail. Judicial Watch Br. 21-22. First, it is

important to remember that this case does not involve a First

Amendment challenge to an effort by the government to

suppress images in the hands of private parties, a challenge that

would come out quite differently. Cf. Forsyth Cnty. v.

Nationalist Movement, 505 U.S. 123, 134-35 (1992) (“Speech

cannot be . . . banned, simply because it might offend a hostile

mob.”). Rather, it is a statutory challenge, in which the sole

question is whether the CIA has properly invoked FOIA

Exemption 1 to authorize withholding images in its own

possession. Cf. Afshar v. Dep’t of State, 702 F.2d 1125, 1131

(D.C. Cir. 1983) (permitting the withholding of documents

under FOIA where release “may force a [foreign] government

to retaliate”). Second, this is not a case in which the declarants

are making predictions about the consequences of releasing just

any images. Rather, they are predicting the consequences of

releasing an extraordinary set of images, ones that depict

American military personnel burying the founder and leader of

5

For the same reasons, these declarations support the agency’s

determination that releasing the images of bin Laden would cause

harm notwithstanding its prior “written descriptions of the event,” 

Judicial Watch Reply Br. 10. See ACLU, 628 F.3d at 625 (“[W]e have

repeatedly rejected the argument that the government’s decision to

disclose some information prevents the government from withholding

other information about the same subject.”); Wolf, 473 F.3d at 378

(permitting withholding notwithstanding “the fact that information

exists in some form in the public domain”).

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al Qaeda. Third, the declarants support those predictions not

with generalized claims, but with specific, reasonably analogous

examples. Finally, it is undisputed that the government is

withholding the images not to shield wrongdoing or avoid

embarrassment, see Exec. Order No. 13,526, § 1.7(a), but rather

to prevent the killing of Americans and violence against

American interests. Indeed, because the CIA’s predictions of

the violence that could accompany disclosure of the images

provide an adequate basis for classification, we do not rely upon

or reach the agency’s alternative argument that the images may

be classified on the ground that their disclosure would facilitate

anti-American propaganda. See ACLU, 628 F.3d at 624

(declining to decide whether classification on that ground is

proper).

As we have said before, “any affidavit or other agency

statement of threatened harm to national security will always be

speculative to some extent.” Id. at 619 (citation omitted). Our

role is to ensure that those predictions are “‘logical’ or

‘plausible.’” Id. (quoting Larson, 565 F.3d at 862). We agree

with the district court that the CIA’s declarations in this case

cross that threshold. See Judicial Watch, 857 F. Supp. 2d at 62.

B

An agency may withhold records under Exemption 1 only

if they are “classified in accordance with the procedural criteria

of the governing Executive Order as well as its substantive

terms.” See Lesar, 636 F.2d at 483. On appeal, Judicial Watch

argues that the CIA failed to follow proper procedures in two

respects.

First, Judicial Watch argues that the images at issue were

not classified until after the CIA received its FOIA request,

thereby triggering special procedural requirements that Judicial

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Watch alleges were not followed. See Exec. Order No. 13,526,

§ 1.7(d) (providing that previously undisclosed information may

be classified after an agency has received a FOIA request “only

if such classification . . . is accomplished on a document-bydocument basis with the personal participation or under the

direction of the agency head, deputy agency head, or the senior

agency official designated under [a section of] this order”). But

Judicial Watch’s factual premise is mistaken, as the CIA has

averred that the images were in fact classified before it received

the appellant’s FOIA request, see Culver Decl. ¶ 7 n.1; CIA Br.

52; Oral Arg. Recording at 28:50-29:20, and there is no

evidence to the contrary.

Second, Judicial Watch argues that the images do not

contain all of the proper classification markings because they

fail to name the person with “original classification authority”

who first classified them. See Exec. Order No. 13,526,

§ 1.6(a)(2). The Culver declaration, which the agency clarified

at oral argument, explains the CIA’s position: the records were

not initially classified by someone with original classification

authority, but rather by an individual who “derivatively”

classified the records by “apply[ing] classification markings

. . . as directed by a classification guide.” Culver Decl. ¶ 8;

Exec. Order No. 13,526, § 2.1(a); see Oral Arg. Recording at

21:30-23:10. Accordingly, the CIA says, the only original

classification authority identified on the records was the

classification guide itself. See Culver Decl. ¶¶ 7-8; Oral Arg.

Recording at 23:05-08.

Although this explanation may account for why the CIA did

not mark the documents with the name of a person possessing

original classification authority, it raises a separate problem. 

Even if the CIA is right that documents can be derivatively

classified and marked in this way -- and we express no view on

the matter -- we cannot determine whether derivative

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classification of the images was proper without some description

of the classification guide on which the derivative classifier

purportedly relied. Yet in this case, the CIA has provided no

description of the guide’s provisions, not even a general

description, that would permit us to determine whether the

derivative classification was properly based on the guide. Cf.

Wilson v. McConnell, 501 F. Supp. 2d 545, 553 (S.D.N.Y. 2007)

(concluding that the derivative classification of a document was

proper by examining specific provisions of a CIA classification

guide that the agency had provided to the court). Hence, we

cannot determine whether the derivative classifier misapplied

the guide, or whether the guide’s instructions were so vague as

to operate as no constraint at all.

In some cases, an agency’s silence on such a matter would

merit a remand requiring an agency official to review the

documents and file an additional affidavit, or, in rare cases,

requiring the district court to review the documents in camera. 

Cf. Allen v. CIA, 636 F.2d 1287, 1292 (D.C. Cir. 1980); Lesar,

636 F.2d at 485; Halperin v. Dep’t of State, 565 F.2d 699, 707

(D.C. Cir. 1977). In this case, however, we already have a

declaration from Director Bennett, who has original

classification authority, see Bennett Decl. ¶ 18, averring that he

reviewed the images and determined that they were correctly

classified Top Secret, id. ¶ 27. Accordingly, because the

“affidavits clearly indicate that the documents fit within the

substantive standards of [the] Executive Order,” and because the

Bennett declaration removes any doubt that a person with

original classification authority has approved the classification

decision, any failure relating to application of the classification

guide would not “reflect adversely on the agency’s overall

classification decision.” Lesar, 636 F.2d at 484, 485. 

Therefore, no further steps are required for us to determine that

withholding the images was warranted. See id.

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III

For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district court

is

Affirmed.

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