Opinion ID: 774052
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Relevant Exemptions under the FOIA

Text: 30 Defendants have invoked five of the FOIA's exceptions in withholding in full or in part materials released in response to Rugiero's requests. First, section 552(b)(2) exempts records related solely to the internal personnel rules and practices of an agency. This court employs a two-prong test developed in other circuits to determine the applicability of this exception. Abraham & Rose, 138 F.3d at 1080. The agency must show that the requested information it seeks to withhold relates predominantly to an agency's rules and practices for personnel. Id. The agency must further show that the public has no legitimate interest in the information requested. Id. This exemption applies to routine matters of merely internal significance. Jones, 41 F.3d at 244 (quoting Lesar v. United States Dep't of Justice, 636 F.2d 472, 485 (D.C. Cir. 1980)). This court has upheld the use of this exemption to withhold file numbers and symbols used to identify informants. Id. at 244-45 (citing Kiraly v. FBI, 728 F.2d 273, 276 n.6 (6th Cir. 1984)). Information that merely has the potential for bringing to light the practices by which an agency collects and processes information does not come within the ambit of the exception. Abraham & Rose, 138 F.3d at 1081. 31 Second, section 552(b)(3) covers matters specifically exempted from disclosure by statute when the statute leaves no discretion about the decision to withhold information from the public or establishes specific criteria for withholding particular types of matters. Accordingly, the scope of the inquiry under this exemption is limited: if a statute exempts materials from disclosure and the requested materials fall within that statute's scope, that is the end of the matter. Though not previously addressed in this circuit, courts have unanimously held that Rule 6(e) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure constitutes a statute under section 552(b)(3) of the FOIA so that an agency may withhold grand jury materials.E.g., Solar Sources, Inc. v. United States, 142 F.3d 1033, 1037 n.4 (7th Cir. 1998); Church of Scientology Int'l v. United States Dep't of Justice, 30 F.3d 224, 235 (1st Cir. 1994); McDonnell v. United States, 4 F.3d 1227, 1246-47 (3d Cir. 1993);Fund for Constitutional Gov't v. National Archives & Records Serv., 656 F.2d 856, 868 (D.C. Cir. 1981). Rule 6(e)(3) outlines the exceptions to the Rule's general prohibition against disclosure of grand jury materials. Nonetheless, documents identified as grand jury exhibits or containing testimony or other material directly associated with grand jury proceedings fall within the exemption under section 552(b)(3) without regard to whether one of the Rule 6(e)(3) exceptions allows disclosure. Church of Scientology, 30 F.3d at 235. Documents created for reasons independent of a grand jury investigation do not. Id. (citing United States v. Dynavac, Inc., 6 F.3d 1407, 1412 (9th Cir. 1993)). 32 Third, section 552(b)(5) exempts inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letters which would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency. This provision protects documents that a private party could not discover in litigation with the agency. Schell v. United States Dep't of Health and Human Servs., 843 F.2d 933, 939 (6th Cir. 1988) (citations omitted). Courts have construed this exception to preserve the recognized evidentiary privileges, such as the attorney-client privilege, the attorney work-product privilege, and the deliberative process privilege.Klamath Water Users Protective Ass'n, 121 S. Ct. at 1065-66; Schell, 843 F.2d at 939 (citing Parke, Davis & Co. v. Califano, 623 F.2d 1, 5 (6th Cir. 1980)). To come within this exception on the basis of the deliberative process privilege, a document must be both predecisional, meaning it is received by the decisionmaker on the subject of the decision prior to the time the decision is made, and deliberative, the result of a consultative process. Schell, 843 F.2d at 940 (citing Parke, Davis & Co., 623 F.2d at 6). Although this privilege covers recommendations, draft documents, proposals, suggestions, and other subjective documents that reflect the opinions of the writer rather than the policy of an agency, the key issue in applying this exception is whether disclosure of the materials would expose an agency's decisionmaking process in such a way as to discourage discussion within the agency and thereby undermine the agency's ability to perform its functions. Id.(quoting Dudman Communications Corp. v. Department of the Air Force, 815 F.2d 1565, 1568 (D.C. Cir. 1987)). 33 Fourth, section 552(b)(6) exempts personnel and medical files and similar files the disclosure of which would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. We have read this section as establishing a two-prong inquiry: (1)whether the file includes personnel, medical, or similar data; and (2) if so, whether disclosure constitutes a clearly unwarranted invasion of privacy. Heights Cmty. Cong. v. Veterans Admin., 732 F.2d 526, 528 (6th Cir. 1984) (citing United States Dep't of State v. Washington Post Co., 456 U.S. 595, 601-02 (1982)). Under the threshold requirement, the exception applies to any government records on an individual which can be identified as applying to that individual. Id. (quoting Washington Post, 456 U.S. at 601-02). Determining whether disclosure works a clearly unwarranted invasion of privacy requires a balancing test under which courts identify the privacy interest at stake and weigh it against the public interest in disclosure. Id. at 529. The central inquiry is whether public access to the information is tantamount to an invasion of privacy; if so we ask whether such an invasion is justified by any countervailing public benefit from disclosure. Id. (quoting Madeira Nursing Ctr., Inc. v. NLRB, 615 F.2d 728, 730 (6th Cir. 1980)) (alterations omitted). A clear privacy interest exists with respect to such information as names, addresses, and other identifying information even where such information is already publicly available. Abraham & Rose, 138 F.3d at 1083 (citing United States Dep't of Defense v. Federal Labor Relations Auth., 510 U.S. 487, 500 (1994)). 34 Fifth, section 552(b)(7) exempts records or information compiled for law enforcement purposes, but only if certain conditions are met. This court has adopted a per se rule under which any documents compiled by a law enforcement agency fall within the first part of the section 552(b)(7) exception. Jones, 41 F.3d at 245. This rule applies not only to criminal enforcement actions, but to records compiled for civil enforcement purposes as well. Abraham & Rose, 138 F.3d at 1083 (citing White v. IRS, 707 F.2d 897, 901 (6th Cir. 1983)). Accordingly, for a law enforcement agency to withhold information under this section, one of the specific provisions of section 552(b)(7) alone need apply. Four of these are relevant: 35 (1) Section 552(b)(7)(C). Information compiled for law enforcement purposes the disclosure of which could reasonably be expected to constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy does not come within the FOIA's disclosure mandate. 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(7)(C). This court construes this section as requiring a balancing test similar to that conducted under section 552(b)(6). Jones, 41. F.3d at 246 (citing Rose, 425 U.S. at 372-73). 36 (2) Section 552(b)(7)(D). Section 552(b)(7)(D) excepts records that could reasonably be expected to disclose the identity of a confidential source. Here, the question is not whether the document is of a type the agency normally treats as confidential, but whether the particular source spoke with an understanding of confidentiality. United States Dep't of Justice v. Landano, 508 U.S. 165, 172 (1993). Unless a promise of confidentiality is expressly given, the government is not entitled to a presumption of confidentiality outside of a narrowly defined set of circumstances supporting such an inference, such as the use of a paid informant. Id. at 173-79. Although not defined in the Act, the Supreme Court has defined confidential in this section as referring to a degree of confidentiality less than total secrecy. Id. at 174. If a confidential source is later revealed, we nonetheless restrict public access to documents under this section so long as the informant and the agency intended the identity of the source to remain undisclosed at the time the agency compiled the information. Jones, 41 F.3d at 249. 37 (3) Section 552(b)(7)(E). This provision allows the withholding of materials that would disclose techniques and procedures for law enforcement investigations or prosecutions, or would disclose guidelines for law enforcement investigations if such disclosure could reasonably be expected to risk circumvention of the law. This provision, however, only protects techniques and procedures not already well-known to the public. E.g., Davin v. United States Dep't of Justice, 60 F.3d 1043, 1064 (3d Cir. 1995) (quoting Ferri v. Bell, 645 F.2d 1213, 1224 (3d Cir. 1981));Rosenfeld v. United States Dep't of Justice, 57 F.3d 803, 815 (9th Cir. 1995) (citations omitted). 38 (4) Section 552(b)(7)(F). This section exempts from disclosure material that could reasonably be expected to endanger the life or physical safety of any individual.