Opinion ID: 8704914
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Plaintiffs request for in camera inspection

Text: Plaintiff has requested in camera review of documents withheld pursuant to Exemption 5 and Exemption 3, in conjunction with 26 U.S.C. §§ 6103(a) and (e)(7). District courts need not and should not make in camera inspections, however, where the government has sustained its burden of proof on the claimed FOIA exemption. See, e.g., ACLU v. U.S. Dep’t of Def., 628 F.3d 612, 626 (D.C.Cir.2011) (when an agency’s declarations “provide specific information sufficient to place the documents within the exemption category, and if there is no evidence in the record of agency bad faith, then summary judgment is appropriate without in camera review”) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted); Weissman, 565 F.2d at 697 (“In every FOIA case, there exists the possibility that [g]overnment affidavits claiming exemptions will be untruthful.... If, as appellant argues, [this] possibility] [is] enough automatically to trigger an in camera investigation, one will be required in every FOIA case. This is clearly not what [C]ongress intended, nor what this Court has found to be necessary.”). For the reasons discussed above, the IRS has met its burden to prove that the withheld documents are totally exempt. Therefore, this Court has an adequate factual basis to make its determination and need not examine the disputed documents in order to determine their exempt status.