Opinion ID: 4231997
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The District Court's Redaction Order

Text: The district court attempted to protect the privacy interests implicated by Eil's request by allowing the government to redact exhibit numbers and personally identifiable information from the requested records. See id. at 489. The court acknowledged that these redactions could not completely safeguard the privacy interests of the former patients because personally identifiable information can be found in the criminal trial transcript and exhibits in the appellate record, all of which are publicly available. See id. at 488. Nonetheless, the district court stated that the redactions would minimize[] the privacy - 15 - interests implicated because they would prevent the identities of the former patients from being easily discerned. Id. at 489. The permitted redactions do not adequately protect the privacy interests implicated by Eil's request. Because the trial transcript contains the names of Dr. Volkman's former patients along with significant information about their medical histories and their interactions with Dr. Volkman, any interested party could readily identify the individuals associated with the records by connecting the trial testimony to the exhibits. And there may be a significant number of parties interested in making these connections, given that Eil is writing a book about the trial and presumably filed his FOIA request because he intends to include detailed information about the former patients in that book. As the dissent acknowledges, Eil represented to the district court that the case should be decided on cross-motions for summary judgment, indicating Eil's own recognition that there were no material facts in dispute. Nonetheless, the dissent makes the argument that Eil declined to make by claiming that there is a dispute of material fact regarding whether the district court's redaction order would create a sufficient obstacle to putting names to the medical records Eil seeks. Eil notes in his brief that the district court's redactions were meant to prevent the public from easily matching up the records to names. But he provides no relevant support for - 16 - the assertion that the redactions in fact accomplished this goal. The dissent highlights two points that Eil made at oral argument: (1) there were many exhibits in the Volkman trial but little trial testimony about those records, and (2) the trial exhibits include medical records of patients who did not testify. Both of these points are red herrings. The DEA has already made available medical records associated with patients who it believes cannot be readily identified from the trial transcript, along with the medical records of deceased patients. The medical records that have been withheld are only the ones that can be associated with the trial testimony. Not only did Eil fail to contest the government's argument that any interested party can use information from the trial transcript -- including patient names, patient medical histories, and information about patient interactions with Dr. Volkman -- to identify the individuals associated with the medical records at issue, but he also failed to put into evidence any portion of the trial transcript in support of any possible objection to the government's contention. And it was his burden to do so. See Favish, 541 U.S. at 172.