Opinion ID: 491631
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Exhaustion under FOIA

Text: 25 Our next step is to distinguish between those periods during which the availability of an administrative FOIA remedy bars suit and those during which it does not (i.e., the periods during which exhaustion may be characterized respectively, as mandatory and permissive). We recently reiterated the law regarding exhaustion in FOIA cases:It goes without saying that exhaustion of remedies is required in FOIA cases. As this court has recently had occasion to state in the clearest of language, [e]xhaustion of such [administrative] remedies is required under the Freedom of Information Act before a party can seek judicial review. Stebbins v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co., 757 F.2d 364 (D.C.Cir. [1985]; see also Crooker v. United States Secret Service, 577 F.Supp. 1218, 1219 (D.D.C.1983). 26 Dettmann v. Department of Justice, 802 F.2d 1472, 1477 (D.C.Cir.1986); see also id. at 1477 n. 8 (Exhaustion has long been required in FOIA cases.). 27 Contrary to appellant's contention, that statement stands only for the unexceptionable proposition that exhaustion is a prerequisite to suit. It does not address the manner in which exhaustion may be accomplished. By virtue of a special provision virtually unique to FOIA, 6 exhaustion is complete--for purposes of allowing recourse to the courts--on the expiration of specified deadlines: 28 Any person making a request to any agency for records ... shall be deemed to have exhausted his administrative remedies with respect to such request if the agency fails to comply with the applicable time limit provisions of this paragraph. 29 5 U.S.C. Sec. 552(a)(6)(C). By deem[ing] exhaustion to occur on expiration of the relevant time limits, the statute provides for constructive exhaustion, which permits early accrual of a cause of action in the interests of timely disclosure. Once constructive exhaustion occurs, any available administrative appeal--i.e., actual exhaustion--becomes permissive in the sense in which the term is used here; the requester may pursue it, but his failure to do so does not bar a lawsuit. See, e.g., Virginia Transformer Co. v. Department of Energy, 628 F.Supp. 944, 947 (W.D.Va.1986); Jenks v. United States Marshals Service, 514 F.Supp. 1383, 1385-87 (S.D.Ohio 1981); Information Acquisition Corp. v. Department of Justice, 444 F.Supp. 458, 462 (D.D.C.1978). 30 There are two time limit provisions that trigger constructive exhaustion. First, the agency has ten days (excepting Saturdays, Sundays, and legal public holidays) after the receipt of any [FOIA] request within which to determine ... whether to comply with such request.... 5 U.S.C. Sec. 552(a)(6)(A)(i). Second, the agency has twenty days (excepting Saturdays, Sundays, and legal public holidays) after receipt of ... [an administrative] appeal within which to make a determination on that appeal. Id. Sec. 552(a)(6)(A)(ii). In either event, the agency can, citing one of three enumerated unusual circumstances, extend either time limit for up to 10 working days, if it notifies the requester expressly. Id. Sec. 552(a)(6)(B). 31 Appellant seems to read Dettmann 's statement that exhaustion of remedies is required as somehow altering this clear reading of the statutory scheme. But Dettmann 's reliance on both Crooker v. United States Secret Service, 577 F.Supp. 1218, 1219 (D.D.C.1983), and Stebbins v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co., 757 F.2d 364 (D.C.Cir.1985) (per curiam), confirms that the Dettmann court intended to break no new legal ground. Crooker explicitly analyzes both constructive and actual exhaustion. 577 F.Supp. at 1219-20. Stebbins summarily dismisses a FOIA suit for failure to exhaust administrative remedies, without recounting the circumstances of the request, 757 F.2d at 366, but cites with approval Hedley v. United States, 594 F.2d 1043, 1044 (5th Cir.1979) (per curiam), which clearly recognized the distinction. 32 Nor do the facts of Dettmann signal a departure from well-settled law. Dettmann requested the FBI to turn over copies of all documents ... which [among other things] contain my name.... 802 F.2d at 1473 (emphasis added) (citation omitted). Instead, pursuant to FBI policy regarding such see references, she was given (with some deletions) only the portions f documents that contained her name. Id. at 1473-74. Dettmann administratively appealed several deletions. But [n]ot a word was said ... in protest against the FBI's practice with respect to 'see' reference materials. Id. at 1474. The court dismissed Dettmann's subsequent lawsuit protesting the FBI's see reference policy, because of her failure to exhaust her remedies on that issue. 33 There is no indication that the FBI failed to meet the 10-day deadline for initial response, thereby triggering the constructive-exhaustion provision and obviating actual exhaustion. 7 But even if it had, the court's conclusion that Dettmann's suit was barred for want of actual exhaustion is perfectly reconcilable with the scheme described above. The court might simply have assumed that when an agency makes its initial response after the 10-day deadline but before the requester has filed suit, the administrative appeal's mandatory character is restored. Under that view of things, the requester's statutory right to sue might perhaps be either suspended (for the brief period during which an administrative appeal is available 8 plus the 20 working days within which it must be processed) or entirely cut off (if the requester never appeals the denial). We need not here discern whether the Dettmann court merely assumed that constructive exhaustion had not occurred or contemplated a revival of the actual exhaustion requirement. In either event, Dettmann did not in any way undermine the proposition that a cause of action under FOIA first accrues when the requester first exhausts his remedies, either constructively or actually. 34