Opinion ID: 1027758
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Applicability of Exemption 5

Text: Next, R & HW contend the district court erred because the USPTO failed to show that many of the documents it claimed as exempt fell within Exemption 5. Some of the documents R & HW challenge on this basis overlap with those challenged above. As we have explained above, if the district court lacked an adequate factual basis for determining whether the exemption applied, it erred. We consider in this section only the documents R & HW challenge that do not overlap, that is, the Vaughn index is adequate to determine the application of the claimed exemption. The sole issue we now examine as to those documents is the district court's determination that Exemption 5 applies, in whole or in part. As noted earlier, Exemption 5 protects from disclosure inter-agency or intraagency memorandums or letters which would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency. 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(5). To qualify, a document must thus satisfy two conditions: its source must be a Government agency, and it must fall within the ambit of a privilege against discovery under judicial standards that would govern litigation against the agency that holds it. Dep't of the Interior v. Klamath Water Users Protective Ass'n (Klamath), 532 U.S. 1, 8, 121 S.Ct. 1060, 149 L.Ed.2d 87 (2001). [25] Among the privileges Exemption 5 encompasses are the attorney-client privilege, the attorney-work product privilege, and the deliberative process privilege. Id. at 8-9, 121 S.Ct. 1060; see also N.L.R.B. v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 421 U.S. 132, 149-50, 95 S.Ct. 1504, 44 L.Ed.2d 29 (1975). [26] Exemption 5 is designed to protect the quality of administrative decisionmaking by ensuring that it is not done `in a fishbowl.' City of Virginia Beach, 995 F.2d at 1252; see also Klamath, 532 U.S. at 8-9, 121 S.Ct. 1060; Jordan v. U.S. Dep't of Justice, 591 F.2d 753, 772-73 (D.C.Cir. 1978) (en banc).
R & HW contend the Agencies improperly withheld or redacted documents that are not inter-agency or intraagency documents, as required to claim Exemption 5. Cf. 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(5). Although Exemption 5's inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letter requirements is not disputed as often, it is no less important than Exemption 5's other requirements. Klamath, 532 U.S. at 9, 121 S.Ct. 1060. Among the documents R & HW identify in support of this inter-agency, intra-agency argument are the at least 334 documents that do not identify the author or recipient. We do not address the merits of Exemption 5 as to those entries because we have already determined that those entries were factually inadequate to reach that issue, supra section III.B.1. We have reviewed the three remaining document entries on the Vaughn index and the redacted versions of the documents that R & HW challenge on this basis and find their contentions to be without merit. [27] Although Document 568 indicates that someone at the Department of Justice (DOJ) was in communication with an RIM attorney, the contents of the e-mail discussion do not support R & HW's assertion that the redacted information in the e-mails was ever communicated to anyone outside the USPTO. (J.A. 1042-43.) Similarly, there is no evidence that the redacted material in Documents 618 or 619, which consist of e-mail discussions between USPTO employees, contains information originating from or communicated to RIM attorneys. (J.A. 1053-57.) The district court did not err in granting summary judgment as to these three entries.
R & HW next assert the district court improperly found the deliberative process privilege protected the Agencies' documents because the Vaughn index entries did not identify the formulation or exercise of policy-oriented judgment at stake for each document on which it asserted the deliberative process privilege. It also contends the district court erred in allowing the Agencies to withhold or redact information that they contend was segregable from protected information. The deliberative process privilege rests on the obvious realization that officials will not communicate candidly among themselves if each remark is a potential item of discovery and front page news, and its object is to enhance the quality of agency decisions by protecting open and frank discussion among those who make them within the Government. Klamath, 532 U.S. at 8-9, 121 S.Ct. 1060 (internal citation omitted). Documents withheld or redacted pursuant to the deliberative process privilege must be both predecisional and deliberative. [28] See City of Virginia Beach, 995 F.2d at 1253. The [d]eliberative material reflects the give-and-take of the consultative process by revealing the manner in which the agency evaluates possible alternative policies or outcomes. Id. (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). Thus, the privilege will encompass recommendations, draft documents, proposals, suggestions, and other subjective documents which reflect the personal opinions of the writer rather than the policy of the agency. Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). We hold the district court did not err in concluding the Agencies were entitled to withhold the challenged documentsin whole or in partas exempt pursuant to the deliberative process privilege. At the outset, we observe that R & HW's FOIA requests were obviously designed to discover information that would naturally fall within this privilege, including internal communications regarding the Campana patents and ongoing patent reexaminations. See Barney v. Internal Revenue Serv., 618 F.2d 1268, 1273 (8th Cir. 1980) (per curiam) (finding it apparent by the very nature of plaintiffs' request that documents would be exempt). A patent reexamination is an administrative proceeding in which patent examiners inquire whether a patent was issued in error based on prior art patents or printed publications. 35 U.S.C. §§ 301-302 (2000). [29] Patent examiners act as quasi-judicial officers during the process of issuing and reexamining patents. See United States v. Am. Bell Tel. Co., 128 U.S. 315, 363, 9 S.Ct. 90, 32 L.Ed. 450 (1888) (patents issue through quasi-judicial proceedings); W. Elec. Co. v. Piezo Tech., Inc., 860 F.2d 428, 431 (Fed.Cir.1988) (Patent examiners are quasi-judicial officials.) (citation omitted). That many responsive documents would reveal the deliberative process of the USPTO can be fairly concluded from the nature of the request, which broadly encompassed the USPTO's reexamination of the Campana patents. We have reviewed a representative sample of the documents listed on the Vaughn index having adequate factual descriptions. We conclude that the district court properly determined they were predecisional and deliberative, containing internal discussions regarding the progress of, procedures for, and determinations in the patent reexaminations and the ongoing litigation surrounding NTP and RIM's patents. [30] These documents then are a product of the USPTO's quasi-judicial role and are clearly protected from disclosure by the deliberative process privilege. Contrary to R & HW's argument, the Agencies were not required to identify the specific policy judgment at issue in each document for which the deliberative process privilege is claimed. As this Court stated in City of Virginia Beach: [T]he government need not identify a specific decision in connection with which a memorandum is prepared. Agencies are, and properly should be, engaged in a continuing process of examining their policies; this process will generate memoranda containing recommendations which do not ripen into agency decisions; and the lower courts should be wary of interfering with this process . . . the line between predecisional documents and postdecisional documents may not always be a bright one. 995 F.2d at 1253 (quoting NLRB, 421 U.S. at 151-52, 95 S.Ct. 1504) (citing Access Reports v. Department of Justice, 926 F.2d 1192, 1196 (D.C.Cir.1991) (rejecting requirement that government pinpoint a single decision to which the [withheld] memorandum contributed)). [31] We further conclude that the district court did not err in finding the Agencies' redactions of documents were appropriate. [32] Because the FOIA focuses on information rather than documents, [a]ny reasonably segregable portion of a record shall be provided to any person requesting such record after deletion of the portions which are exempt. . . . § 552(b) (emphasis added). Therefore, non-exempt portions of documents must be disclosed unless they are `inextricably intertwined' with exempt portions, Mead Data Cent., Inc., 566 F.2d at 260, such that the disclosure of those facts would compromise the confidentiality of the deliberative information that is entitled to protection under Exemption 5, in which case the factual materials need not be disclosed. Envtl. Prot. Agency v. Mink, 410 U.S. 73, 92, 93 S.Ct. 827, 35 L.Ed.2d 119 (1973). R & HW asserts the Agencies inconsistently redacted information in different versions of the same documents, rendering their entire method of claiming redactions suspect. (Blue Br. 47-50.) We have reviewed the documents cited by R & HW and find no error in the district court's decision allowing the Agencies' redactions. In many instances, the inconsistencies are minor, and in no way suggest the Agencies were not entitled to withhold the remaining portions of the documents under Exemption 5. (E.g., J.A. 1042-43, with 1065-66.) Especially where a FOIA request yields the number of responsive documents as did the R & HW requests, minor differences in a line-by-line redaction are not unexpected. R & HW also refer to a January 2005 document that was initially withheld pursuant to Exemption 5, but subsequently released in full. R & HW contend the document's full content offers no basis for claiming Exemption 5, and that this example calls into question the information [they have] redacted in other documents. R & HW offers no support for this proposition, nor any evidence of bad faith on the part of the Agencies. We decline R & HW's invitation to infer from this one example that the Agencies have improperly invoked Exemption 5 to redact other documents. R & HW further assert the Agencies improperly redacted the subject lines of e-mails, file names to documents attached to e-mails, patent claim reference numbers, meeting agenda topics, and other identifying factual information that was not subject to the deliberative process privilege. Given the FOIA's strong preference for disclosure, factual information that does not compromise the exempt portions of the documents should be disclosed. Mink, 410 U.S. at 91, 93 S.Ct. 827. This standard is high, but not impregnable. Thus, facts contained in such documents must be considered within the context of the document as a whole, and within the context of the document as part of the agency's overall decision-making process. Id. at 91-92, 93 S.Ct. 827; see also City of Virginia Beach, 995 F.2d at 1256 (Disclosure of much of the material necessarily would reveal the opinions of agency personnel on the credibility and probity of the evidence relating to each allegation such that the revelation would divulge the substance of any related recommendations with which the factual findings comport. More generally, by disclosing the direction of the agency's internal investigation and retrospective assessment, revelation would impermissibly encroach upon the decisionmaking process. (internal alterations, quotation marks, and citations omitted)). We have reviewed the documents R & HW challenge and find no error in the decision below. Information reasonably described as facts when looked at in the vacuum that R & HW describe are nonetheless protected from disclosure when as revealed when examining the information's contextdisclosing that information as part of a larger document would reveal the very predecisional and deliberative material Exemption 5 protects. Here, the Agencies provided a Vaughn index describing, as relevant, the reasons for the claimed exemption and a claim that the facts contained in the document were not segregable from the opinions expressed therein. In addition, Fawcett provided an affidavit averring he personally conducted a line-by-line review of each document to determine what information to release or withhold, in whole or in part. The combination of these statements, coupled with a review of the documents R & HW challenge supports the Agencies' decisions regarding the information redacted. Accordingly, the district court did not err in holding the Agencies properly withheld the challenged documents in whole or in part based on the deliberative process privilege. Nor did it err in concluding the challenged redacted documents did not contain segregable material.
R & HW next contend that the Agencies failed to show that the documents they withheld under the attorney-client privilege component of Exemption 5 were protected by that privilege. The attorney-client privilege is designed to encourage full and frank communication between attorneys and their clients and thereby promote broader public interests in the observance of law and administration of justice. Upjohn Co. v. United States, 449 U.S. 383, 389, 101 S.Ct. 677, 66 L.Ed.2d 584 (1981). It is not limited to communications made in the context of litigation or even a specific dispute, but extends to all situations in which an attorney's counsel is sought on a legal matter. Coastal States Gas Corp., 617 F.2d at 862. Moreover, the privilege protects `not only the giving of professional advice to those who can act on it but also the giving of information to the lawyer to enable him to give sound and informed advice.' Hanson v. U.S. Agency for Int'l Dev., 372 F.3d 286, 291 (4th Cir.2004) (quoting Upjohn, 449 U.S. at 390, 101 S.Ct. 677). [A]n agency can be a `client' and agency lawyers can function as `attorneys' within the relationship contemplated by the privilege. Coastal States Gas Corp., 617 F.2d at 863; see also Mead Data Cent., Inc., 566 F.2d at 252 ([T]he attorney-client privilege assures [the client] that confidential communications to his attorney will not be disclosed without his consent. We see no reason why this same protection should not be extended to an agency's communications with its attorneys under [Exemption 5].). Where the client is an organization, the privilege extends to those communications between attorneys and all agents or employees of the organization who are authorized to act or speak for the organization in relation to the subject matter of the communication. Mead Data Central, Inc., 566 F.2d at 253 n. 24. To fall within the privilege, the USPTO must also demonstrate the confidentiality of the information on which [the documents] are based, either by showing an express or implied grant of confidentiality based on the circumstances surrounding the creation and dissemination of the document. See Maine v. United States Dep't of the Interior, 298 F.3d at 71-72. Similarly, the attorney client privilege can be waived if the document is published, or disclosed to private individuals or to nonfederal agencies. Mead Data Cent., Inc., 566 F.2d at 253. Here, Fawcett's declaration describes when a document was marked as exempt from disclosure based on attorney-client privilege: [T]he identity of the attorney is provided in the to/from list and may be further identified on the separate List of Employee Names and Titles; the client for all of this group of documents is the USPTO; the privilege was only asserted where the attorney was acting as an attorney; the substance of the communication is indicated on the amended Vaughn Index to the extent possible without revealing privileged information; and there is no indication that the confidential communications therein were inappropriately disclosed to unauthorized parties. (J.A. 277.) Furthermore, the communications involved the exchange of facts and legal opinion contemplated by the attorney-client privilege. [33] The documents withheld or redacted pursuant to this privilege contain discussions regarding the patent reexamination process and the ongoing litigation regarding the patents subject to the reexaminations. We find that Fawcett's declaration, coupled with the Vaughn index descriptions, support the Agencies' claim of attorney-client privilege for the challenged documents. Nor is there any support for R & HW's assertion that attorney-client privilege was waived through disclosure to a third party. Document 1599 is another copy of the same August 2005 e-mail between a DOJ attorney and USPTO employees discussed earlier. Although the e-mail indicates that an attorney at the DOJ was in communication with an RIM attorney regarding the patent infringement litigation, the DOJ attorney is seeking the USPTO's opinion on what the DOJ's position on a particular issue should be. The DOJ attorney's e-mail was then forwarded to several employees within the USPTO, who appear to offer their view and opinion on what the USPTO's position should be. Nothing in the e-mail discussion support R & HW's assertion that the redacted information in the e-mails was ever communicated to anyone outside the USPTO. (J.A. 1065-66; compare with 1042-434.) Lastly, R & HW assert that any discussions regarding the patent infringement action between NTP and RIM cannot be protected by attorney-client privilege. While it is true that the USPTO was not a party to that litigation, the litigation and the patent reexaminations involved the same patents and many similar issues. Therefore, it is not improbable that USPTO employees, including the patent reexaminers, would discuss new developments in the NTP-RIM litigation. Because the attorney-client privilege extends beyond communications in contemplation of particular litigation to communications regarding an opinion on the law, e.g., United States v. Jones, 696 F.2d 1069, 1072 (4th Cir. 1982), these communications can still be afforded protection under the attorney-client privilege. On this record, the district court did not err in concluding the USPTO properly withheld or redacted materials based on the attorney-client privilege, as protected by Exemption 5. [34]