Opinion ID: 1027758
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Identification of the Document's Author or Recipient

Text: R & HW claim the district court erred in finding the Vaughn index entries were sufficient for at least 334 documents that do not identify their author, recipient, date of origin, or source. We have reviewed both the Vaughn index and Fawcett's declarations regarding the compilation of materials on the index. Almost all of the documents cited by R & HW state n/a in the index column devoted to identifying the employees authoring or receiving the listed document. [20] We agree with R & HW that the Vaughn index documents that fail to include information about their author and recipient, or which fail to provide an explanation that adequately substitutes for this information, do not contain adequate information for the district court to have determined whether they were properly withheld. [21] In Ethyl Corporation, this Court observed that where the description of a document listed in the Vaughn index fails to identify either the author or its recipient, those persons' relationships to the decisionmaking process cannot be identified and it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to perceive how the disclosure of such documents would result in a chilling effect upon the open and frank exchange of opinions within the agency. 25 F.3d at 1250. Similarly, the Agencies have not identified the author or recipient of many documents they claim are protected by the deliberative process privilege. Nor have they provided any information as to the origin or intended target of the challenged documents. Without this information, it is difficult, if not impossible, to determine whether they fall under Exemption 5. Cf. Ethyl Corp., 25 F.3d at 1250. Ethyl Corporation left open, as do we, the possibility that the district court may be able to determine whether the deliberative process privilege applies without knowing the author and recipient. However, the Agencies' Vaughn index simply states n/a and provides no information regarding who created the document, for whom it was prepared, or to whom it was distributed. Without this contextual information, we cannot determine whether Exemption 5 protects the challenged document from disclosure. [22] In requiring Vaughn index entries to include information as to the author and recipient of the documents, we are mindful that the Agencies may still be able to satisfy their burden for purposes of withholding the document by revising the Vaughn index to correct the deficiencies, by producing the documents for in camera review, or by a combination of methods. However, we find that the challenged entries, which fail to provide any information about the document's author or recipient, are inadequate under Ethyl Corporation. The district court thus erred in finding these challenged Vaughn index entries provided an adequate basis from which to determine that Exemption 5 applied to those documents.