UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 

______________________________ 

 ) 

LARRY W. BRYANT, ) 

 ) 

Plaintiff, ) 

 ) 

 v. ) Civ. Action No. 09-0940 (EGS) 

 ) 

CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, ) 

et al. ) 

 ) 

Defendants. ) 

______________________________) 

MEMORANDUM OPINION 

 This matter is before the Court on plaintiff’s motion for 

reconsideration1 of the Court’s denial of his request for 

attorneys’ fees. Upon consideration of the motion, the response 

and reply thereto, the applicable law, the entire record, and 

for the reasons set forth below, the plaintiff’s motion is 

DENIED. 

I. BACKGROUND 

 As set forth in this Court’s prior Memorandum Opinion, 

plaintiff Larry Bryant “gathers, researches, and publishes 

documents and information and analysis concerning Unidentified 

                                                            

1

 Plaintiff, though he asks the Court to “reconsider” the 

denial of attorneys’ fees, styles his motion as one to alter or 

amend the judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e). 

Due to the interlocutory nature of the Court’s earlier ruling, 

however, plaintiff’s motion is properly considered under Rule 

54(b), not Rule 59. 
2 

Flying Objects” as the Director of the Washington D.C. Office of 

Citizens Against UFO Secrecy and writes for the monthly 

periodical UFO Magazine. Compl. ¶ 4. In 2008, plaintiff sent 

the Central Intelligence Agency (“CIA”) a request for 

information under the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) 

requesting “CIA-received and CIA-generated records as pertain 

to . . . cases of airborne UFO encounters reportedly occurring 

since Nov. 17, 1986” and records relating to “a 1987 special 

meeting at FAA headquarters in Washington D.C. to discuss and 

evaluate certain official evidence of the intrusive UFO 

encounter experienced on Nov. 17, 1986 by the Japanese flight 

crew (No. 1628) of a 747 cargo jet.” Compl. Ex. A. In the same 

request, he asked to be granted status as a representative of 

the news media and thereby be exempt from certain fees typically 

charged for a FOIA request. Compl. Ex. A. 

 In their response to plaintiff’s FOIA request, the CIA 

offered to provide the plaintiff with 2,779 pages of materials 

for $267.90 in copying costs, describing the materials as 

records already located in response to “numerous previous 

request[s]” for information regarding UFOs. Compl. Ex. B. 

Plaintiff’s request for a fee waiver was denied on the grounds 

that the information sought was “already in the public domain 

and its re-release would not likely contribute significantly to 

public understanding of the operations and activities of the 
3 

United States Government.” Compl. Ex. B. Plaintiff appealed 

the agency’s decision, including the denial of the request for a 

fee waiver. Compl. Ex. C. The CIA again denied the request for 

a fee waiver. Compl. Ex. D. In their letter denying the 

appeal, the CIA also explained that plaintiff would be charged 

the $267.90 in copying costs irrespective of whether he was 

placed in the news media fee category. Compl. Ex. D. 

Plaintiff commenced this lawsuit on May 20, 2009. On June 

23, 2009, the CIA sent a letter to plaintiff informing plaintiff 

that, (i) the CIA would reopen his FOIA request, (ii) the CIA 

would conduct another search for records in existence through 

June 15, 2009, and (iii) the CIA would place the plaintiff in 

the news media fee category and only charge him for photocopying 

costs. Defs.’ Summ. J. Mot. Ex. E. According to defendants, 

new searches were then conducted for responsive information, and 

the CIA followed up with another letter dated October 21, 2009. 

Defs.’ Summ. J. Mot. Ex. E. 

The October 21st letter informed the plaintiff that new 

materials responsive to his general request had been located. 

Defs.’ Summ. J. Mot. Ex. F. However, because the newlyidentified responsive materials were not “originated by the 

CIA,” the request would need to be referred to the originating 

agencies. Defs.’ Summ. J. Mot. Ex. F. Plaintiff received 

subsequent FOIA response letters from the NSA and the Department 
4 

of State regarding these additional materials, including five 

pages of materials with redactions from the Department of State. 

Pl.’s Resp. to Defs.’ Statement of Material Facts ¶ 36. 

On September 30, 2010, the Court granted partial summary 

judgment to defendants, finding that defendants fulfilled their 

FOIA obligations in conducting a reasonably diligent search and 

that the second count in the complaint, relating the news media 

fee category, was moot. The Court also denied plaintiff’s 

request for attorneys’ fees. In the pending motion, plaintiff 

seeks reconsideration of this denial of attorneys’ fees. 

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW 

A district court may revise its own interlocutory rulings 

“at any time before the entry of judgment adjudicating all the 

claims and all the parties’ rights and liabilities.” Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 54(b). Due to the interlocutory nature of the Court’s 

earlier ruling, plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration is 

governed by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(b), which 

“differs from the standards applied to final judgments under 

Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 59(e) and 60(b).” Williams v. 

Savage, 569 F. Supp. 2d 99, 108 (D.D.C. 2008)(citations 

omitted). “In particular, reconsideration of an interlocutory 

decision is available under the standard ‘as justice requires.’” 

Judicial Watch v. Dep’t of Army, 466 F. Supp. 2d 112, 123 

(D.D.C. 2006) (citations omitted). 
5 

“‘As justice requires’ indicates concrete considerations” 

by the court, Williams, 569 F. Supp. 2d at 108, such as “whether 

the court patently misunderstood the parties, made a decision 

beyond the adversarial issues presented, made an error in 

failing to consider controlling decisions or data, or whether a 

controlling or significant change in the law has occurred.” Id. 

In Def. of Animals v. Nat’l Inst. of Health, 543 F. Supp. 2d 70, 

75 (D.D.C. 2008) (internal citation and quotation marks 

omitted). “Furthermore, the party moving to reconsider carries 

the burden of proving that some harm would accompany a denial of 

the motion to reconsider.” Id. at 76. “These considerations 

leave a great deal of room for the court’s discretion and, 

accordingly, the ‘as justice requires’ standard amounts to 

determining ‘whether reconsideration is necessary under the 

relevant circumstances.’” Judicial Watch, 466 F. Supp. 2d at 

123 (quoting Cobell v. Norton, 224 F.R.D. 266, 272 (D.D.C. 

2004)). 

Plaintiff asks the Court to reconsider the denial of an 

award of attorneys’ fees. Though plaintiff does not explicitly 

state so, he appears to base his motion on an argument that the 

Court failed to consider controlling precedent. For the reasons 

stated below, the Court DENIES plaintiff’s motion for 

reconsideration. 
6 

III. ANALYSIS 

In a FOIA action, courts “may assess against the United 

States reasonable attorney fees and other litigation costs 

reasonably incurred in any case under this section in which the 

complainant has substantially prevailed.” 5 U.S.C. 

§ 552(a)(4)(E)(i). In determining whether an award of 

attorneys’ fees is appropriate, courts employ a two-pronged 

analysis. First, “[t]he eligibility prong asks whether a 

plaintiff has ‘substantially prevailed’ and thus ‘may’ receive 

fees.” Brayton v. Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, 641 

F.3d 521, 524 (D.C. Cir. 2011). With respect to this first 

prong, the statute defines substantially prevails as relief 

obtained either (1) through “a judicial order, or an enforceable 

written agreement, or consent decree,” or (2) through a 

“voluntary or unilateral change in position by the agency, if 

the complainant’s claim is not insubstantial.” 5 U.S.C. 

§ 552(a)(4)(E)(ii). 

If a plaintiff is “eligible” for attorneys fees, the court 

proceeds to the second prong, i.e. the “entitlement prong,” and 

“considers a variety of factors to determine whether the 

plaintiff should receive fees.” Brayton, 641 F.3d at 524. 

Specifically, the Court considers, “(1) the public benefit 

derived from the case; (2) the commercial benefit to the 

plaintiff; (3) the nature of the plaintiff’s interest in the 
7 

records; and (4) the reasonableness of the agency’s withholding 

of the requested documents.” Davy v. CIA, 550 F.3d 1155, 1159 

(D.C. Cir. 2008) (citations omitted). The decision to award 

attorneys’ fees and costs is left to the Court’s discretion 

after consideration of the relevant factors. See Nationwide 

Bldg. Maint., Inc. v. Sampson, 559 F.2d 704, 705-06 (D.C. Cir. 

1977) (stating that § 552(a)(4)(E) “contemplates a reasoned 

exercise of the courts’ discretion taking into account all 

relevant factors”). 

The first factor, the public benefit derived from the case, 

“requires consideration of both the effect of the litigation for 

which fees are requested and the potential public value of the 

information sought.” Davy, 550 F.3d at 1159 (citing Chesapeake 

Bay Found. v. USDA, 108 F.3d 375, 377 (D.C. Cir. 1997)). “The 

public-benefit prong speaks for an award of attorneys’ fees 

where the complainant’s victory is likely to add to the fund of 

information that citizens may use in making vital political 

choices.” Cotton v. Heyman, 63 F.3d 1115, 1120 (D.C. Cir. 1995). 

see also Horsehead Indus. Inc. v. U.S. EPA, 999 F. Supp. 59, 68 

(D.D.C. 1998) (“The inquiry is furthered by considering the 

likely degree of dissemination and the public impact that can be 

expected from a particular disclosure, but it is the benefit 

that derives from the litigation not simply the request that is 

considered.”) (internal citations omitted). 
8 

In assessing the public benefit derived from the case, the 

Court “evaluate[s] the specific documents at issue in the case 

at hand.” Cotton, 63 F.3d at 1120 (emphasis added). The 

crucial defect in plaintiff’s request for attorneys’ fees is 

that plaintiff, in both the initial request and again in this 

motion for reconsideration, fails to provide the Court with any 

basis for determining that the specific documents he obtained as 

a consequence of this litigation confer some benefit to the 

public. It is undisputed that plaintiff obtained, in total, 

“two excised documents totaling five pages” from the Department 

of State, Pl.’s Statement of Material Facts ¶ 36; all other 

materials were offered to plaintiff before he commenced his 

lawsuit. Plaintiff, other than making generic assertions that a 

public benefit was derived from this case because the CIA 

“turned over additional documents,” does not articulate any 

reason the public derives any benefit from the particular 

information he obtained. 

By comparison, the Circuit in Davy concluded, after 

evaluating the specific documents obtained by plaintiff in that 

case, that: 

The information [plaintiff] requested -- about 

individuals allegedly involved in President Kennedy’s 

assassination -- serves a public benefit. At least 

one of the requested documents was not previously 

available to the public, and the agency did not 

challenge [plaintiff’s] description of the released 

documents as providing ‘important new information 
9 

bearing on the controversy over former [District 

Attorney Jim] Garrison’s contention that the CIA was 

involved’ in the assassination plot. . . . [S]ome of 

the material turned over to [Davy] concerns an event 

of national importance and is newly released[.] 

Id. (emphasis added). Similarly, in Judicial Watch, Inc. v. 

DHS, Civ. No. 08-2133, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 59148 (D.D.C. 2009) 

this Court concluded that there was a public benefit derived 

from the case and awarded attorneys’ fees to a plaintiff who 

obtained video footage of an incursion by Mexican police 

officers into the United States because the footage 

“contribut[ed] to the public forum and fund of information from 

which citizens may make political choices.” Id.; see also 

Campaign for Responsible Transplantation v. FDA, 593 F. Supp. 2d 

236, 241 (D.D.C. 2009)(finding a public benefit and awarding 

attorneys’ fees because plaintiff was a “nonprofit, public 

interest group designed to alert the public of issues associated 

with xenotransplantation . . . and the documents released after 

the plaintiff initiated this lawsuit furthered this mission.”). 

Unlike the cases discussed above, there is no indication in the 

instant case, either in the plaintiff’s briefs or his 

declarations that the records obtained as a consequence of this 

litigation are of any public value. “Where, as here, there was 

no public benefit to the litigation, an award of attorneys’ fees 
10 

and costs is unwarranted.” Chesapeake Bay Found., 108 F.3d at 

378.2 

Even assuming that the remaining factors — which evaluate 

whether plaintiff seeks to gain a commercial or personal benefit 

from the requested materials and whether the agency had a 

reasonable basis for not disclosing the material – would 

otherwise weigh in favor of an award of attorneys’ fees, such a 

determination would not overcome the Court’s conclusion here. 

“FOIA’s fees provision seeks to promote” activity that would 

“ferret out and make public worthwhile, previously unknown 

government information[.]” Davy, 550 F.3d at 1160. Plaintiff, 

whose motion for attorneys’ fees merely vaguely asserts that the 

“[t]he new search turned up documents by the United States 

Department of State, and the United States National Security 

Agency,” fails to persuade the Court that his victory was “not 

                                                            

2

 In support of his position that the public derived a 

benefit from his victory, plaintiff cites to National Security 

Archive v. CIA, 584 F. Supp. 2d 144 (D.D.C. 2008), claiming it 

is relevant to this case because “the CIA’s denial to Plaintiff 

of news media representative status . . . came at a time that 

the CIA was also wrongfully denying such a status to the 

National Security Archive.” Pl.’s Mem. at 5. That opinion, 

however, made no mention of attorneys’ fees; rather, it merely 

held that the CIA wrongfully denied news media status to a 

particular organization. The Court is not persuaded that the 

CIA’s wrongful denial of news media status on a prior, unrelated 

occasion is relevant to a determination of whether the plaintiff 

in the instant case is entitled to attorneys’ fees. 
11 

insubstantial.” 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(4)(E)(ii)(II).3 The Court 

accordingly declines to exercise its discretion to grant an 

award of attorneys’ fees. 

IV. CONCLUSION 

For the foregoing reasons, it is hereby ordered that 

plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration is DENIED. An 

appropriate Order accompanies this Memorandum Opinion. 

SIGNED: Emmet G. Sullivan 

United States District Court Judge 

October 14, 2011 

                                                            

3

 Plaintiff also argues that that he is entitled to 

attorneys’ fees because the agency changed its position and, 

after initially denying his request, ultimately granted his 

request to be placed in the news media fee category. The Court 

finds this unpersuasive. Not only has plaintiff not persuaded 

the Court that any public benefit is derived from such a change 

in position, such a change in position provides merely a 

personal benefit to plaintiff. Similarly, in Chesapeake Bay 

Found., the Circuit held that an award of attorneys’ fees was 

not appropriate because the only benefit plaintiff derived from 

the litigation “was that the [plaintiff] did not have to pay for 

postage . . . which is hardly a significant public benefit.” 

108 F.3d at 377. Nor, for the same reasons, is plaintiff’s 

assertion that he is entitled to attorneys’ fees simply because 

the agency performed an additional search persuasive.