Opinion ID: 185028
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: analysis

Text: 16 The first and, as it turns out here, only issue before the court is a question of standing. If, as we hold, petitioners lack standing, then this court is without jurisdiction to decide the merits of their claims. See Steel Co. v. Citizens for a Better Env't, 523 U.S. 83, 94-95 (1998). In order to establish their standing, petitioners must show that they have suffered a particularized injury to a cognizable interest, which is fairly traceable to the Board's actions, and that a favorable judicial decision will redress the injury. See Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61 (1992). The problem facing petitioners in this case is that they have suffered no injury. 17 Petitioners argue that they are injured in two ways by the Board's refusal to give them a copy of the cargo list. First, they argue that the denial of information injures them, because they need the information to correct the Board's faulty report, which may be used against them in a civil suit.Second, they contend that they have suffered an informational injury, because, they claim, they have a legal right to obtain the cargo list. These arguments are meritless.
18 Petitioners apparently are afraid that the factual portion of NTSB's report may be admitted as evidence in a lawsuit that Federal Express has filed against them. See Joint Br. for Petitioners at 21 ([S]ome day a judge and/or a jury may be asked to rely on supposedly 'factual' evidence from an NTSB investigation that did not include all pertinent material.).Petitioners object to the report as written, and they hope that the information they seek will reveal new evidence that they can employ to convince the NTSB to change its report so that it will not be so damaging to them in the pending lawsuit. This alleged injury is not cognizable, because petitioners bring this petition for review as parties to an NTSB investigation, and, as parties, they cannot claim injuries that they might suffer as defendants in an entirely separate civil lawsuit. 19 As an initial matter, we reject the premise that NTSB's report itself is admissible in a civil lawsuit. Congress has quite explicitly provided that, 20 [n]o part of a report of the Board, related to an accident or an investigation of an accident, may be admitted into evidence or used in a civil action for damages resulting from a matter mentioned in the report. 21 49 U.S.C. 1154(b) (1994). The simple truth here is that NTSB investigatory procedures are not designed to facilitate litigation, and Congress has made it clear that the Board and its reports should not be used to the advantage or disadvantage of any party in a civil lawsuit. In our view, this congressional mandate could not be clearer. 22 Petitioners point out that, despite the statute's clear language, some early circuit court opinions held that NTSB factual findings were admissible in civil litigation. Joint Br. for Petitioners at 20 (citing authority). A careful review of these opinions, however, shows that these early cases actually focused only on the admissibility of investigators' reports which were mislabeled by the courts as report[s] of the Board. See, e.g., American Airlines, Inc. v. United States, 418 F.2d 180, 196 (5th Cir. 1969) (allowing admission of graphs that were based on information from a safety committee's report); Berguido v. Eastern Air Lines, Inc., 317 F.2d 628, 631-32 (3d Cir. 1963) (allowing testimony of witness based on investigator's report); Lobel v. American Airlines, Inc., 192 F.2d 217, 220 (2d Cir. 1951) (allowing admission of an investigator's report of his examination of the plane wreckage). Because of this judicial mislabeling, these circuits created what they supposed was an exception to 1154(b) for factual data from NTSB investigations in order to protect the interests of alleged victims. See, e.g., Berguido, 317 F.2d at 631-32 (finding testimony based on an investigator's report admissible, despite the statute, because of the need to compromise between the interests of those who would adopt a policy of absolute privilege ... and the countervailing policy of making available all accident information to litigants in a civil suit). In short, the need to insure that victims had access to investigators' factual data surrounding an accident prompted the courts in the early years to allow admission of what they labeled as a report of the Board. 23 When faced with the judiciary's literal distortion of the statute, the Board, in 1975, responded by amending its regulations to make clear that investigators' reports--the very reports that some courts were already admitting--are not reports of the Board for the purpose of 1154(b). Section 835.2 defines the Board's accident report as the report containing the Board's determinations, including the probable cause of an accident. 49 C.F.R. 835.2 (1998). No part of this report may be admitted as evidence or used in any suit or action for damages growing out of any matter mentioned in such reports. Id. (using almost the exact language of 49 U.S.C. 1154(b)). A factual accident report, on the other hand, is an investigator's report of his investigation of the accident. Id. Because this report is not a report of the Board, it is not barred by the statute and is therefore admissible. As counsel for NTSB made clear during oral argument, the only reports that are admissible are the factual reports that investigators do, not the Board's findings, either factual or probable cause, but what individual investigators find.... [T]hose reports of these factual developments are made part of the record and parties can get that.Audio-tape of Oral Arguments (Nov. 15, 1999). Thus, because investigators' reports are now plainly admissible under agency regulations, victims have access to necessary factual information. Therefore, courts no longer need to employ an exception to the statute to protect parties in litigation. 24 Our research indicates that, since the promulgation of the Board's 1975 rule, only two circuit court opinions have failed to recognize that the admissibility of investigators' reports obviates the need for a judicial exception to the statute. See Mullan v. Quickie Aircraft Corp., 797 F.2d. 845, 848 (10th Cir. 1986) ([E]xpert witness properly relied on the factual portions of the NTSB report.); Curry v. Chevron, USA 779 F.2d 272, 274 (5th Cir. 1985) (acknowledging judicial gloss of the statute that allow[s] factual portions of the report to be admitted). In each case, the courts distinguished between the factual portions of Board reports and parts of NTSB reports which contain agency conclusions on the probable cause of accidents. Mullan, 797 F.2d at 848. However, neither opinion is weighty authority, even for the limited rule enunciated, because there are later decisions from both circuits that adhere to the strict terms of the statute. Subsequent to Mullan, the Tenth Circuit has held that, [c]onsistent with its fact-finding mission that is litigation neutral, NTSB reports are barred as evidence in court. Thomas Brooks v. Burnett, 920 F.2d 634, 639 (10th Cir. 1990); accord Jetcraft Corp. v. Flight Safety Int'l, 16 F.3d 362, 366 (10th Cir. 1993). And even more recently, in 1998, the Fifth Circuit has noted that: 25 Federal law flatly prohibits the NTSB accident report from being admitted into evidence in any suit for dam-ages arising out of accidents investigated by the NTSB. 26 Campbell v. Keystone Aerial Surveys, Inc., 138 F.3d 996, 1001 (5th Cir. 1998). 27 We agree with these recent decisions from the Fifth and Tenth Circuits, and also a decision from the Ninth Circuit, see Benna v. Reeder Flying Serv., Inc., 578 F.2d 269, 271 (9th Cir. 1978), holding that, under the plain terms of the statute, NTSB reports are inadmissible in civil litigation. When the statute was interpreted broadly to include investigators' reports, there may have been a public policy justification for admitting factual information. However, once the statute was interpreted more narrowly, no justification remained for any exception to 1154(b). 28 Moreover, as this case demonstrates, admitting Board reports into civil litigation can have the unsavory affect of embroiling NTSB in the interests of civil litigants. Thus, the statute means what it says: No part of the Board's actual report is admissible as evidence in a civil suit. See Universal Airline, Inc. v. Eastern Air Lines, Inc., 188 F.2d 993, 1000 (D.C. Cir. 1951) (noting that the Board should not be compelled to produce its reports). Because it is the Board's actual report that petitioners hope to change, they are not injured by their inability to change it, because it is not admissible in a civil suit. 29 Even if the report were admissible, however, petitioners' injury as civil litigants is simply not cognizable in this case. Petitioners bring this suit as parties to an NTSB investigation. As parties, they signed a statement agreeing that their participation would be for the purpose of assisting NTSB's investigation and would not be for the purpose of preparing for litigation. See Statement of Party Representatives to NTSB Investigation, reprinted in 1 Deferred Appendix at 435. Furthermore, NTSB's investigations are fact-finding proceedings; they are not conducted for the purpose of determining the rights or liabilities of any party. Therefore, the injuries petitioners might suffer as civil defendants are not relevant to their status as parties. Accordingly, because petitioners bring this suit as parties to an NTSB investigation, their injuries as civil litigants are not legally cognizable. Whatever data they may require in litigation, apart from the Board's report, may be obtained through the normal course of discovery.
30 Petitioners also argue that NTSB's denial of information has caused them an informational injury. Petitioners rely principally on Cummock v. Gore, 180 F.3d 282 (D.C. Cir. 1999), which held that, as a member of a committee regulated by the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), Cummock had a right of participation that created a right to information, and that she suffered an injury under FACA insofar as the Commission denied her requests for information that it was required to produce. 180 F.3d at 290. Petitioners argue that, as parties to an NTSB investigation, they have judicially-enforceable Cummock rights that entitle them to the information they seek. Joint Br. for Petitioners at 26.Petitioners' argument fails, however, because, unlike FACA, nothing in NTSB's statute, regulations, or other sources of law requires NTSB to produce this information to petitioners. Therefore, the denial of information does not give rise to an informational injury. 31 Unlike FACA, NTSB's organic statute does not grant parties to an NTSB investigation rights of participation. FACA provides that federal advisory committees are to be fairly balanced and structured to insure that the advice of the committee reflects its independent judgment. 5 U.S.C.A. app. 2 5(b)(2) (1996); id. at (b)(3). In Cummock, this court held that, to give meaning to FACA's fair balance and independent judgment provisions, the Act must be read to confer on a committee member the right to fully participate in the work of the committee to which he or she is appointed. Id. at 291. The right of participation, the court held, endowed committee members with a right to information. See id. at 292. NTSB's statute does not confer any such rights on a party to an investigation. Congress, quite simply, provided that [t]he National Transportation Safety Board shall investigate or have investigated (in detail the Board prescribes) and establish the facts, circumstances, and cause or probable cause of--(A) an aircraft accident.... 49 U.S.C. 1131(a)(1). The statute does not require the investigation either to be balanced or even to involve any outside persons; it places the responsibility of investigating the accident solely within NTSB's hands. Thus, nothing in the statute gives petitioners the Cummock rights of participation and information that they seek to enforce. 32 In addition, there is legislative history showing that Congress did not want the interests of private parties to constrain an NTSB investigation. The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation noted that [c]ourts typically have recognized and appreciated the important public purpose served by the NTSB's ability to conduct prompt investigations without the burdens and interference that would stem from injecting the civil litigation interests into the NTSB's accident investigation process. S. Rep. No. 101-450, at 5. The Committee continued, adding that 33 [t]he time devoted by NTSB investigations in defending their decisions diverts the energies that they should be directing to investigating the accidents.... [T]he committee strongly believes that the ability of the NTSB to conduct investigations independently, thoroughly, and in a timely manner for the benefit of the public, should not be compromised. 34 Id. Equipping parties with a right to information would inject[ ] the civil litigation interests into the NTSB investigation process and compromise the investigation, a prospect against which Congress admonished. Thus, not only does the statute fail to endow parties with a right to information, legislative history admonishes against reading such a right into the statute. 35 Neither can the right be found, as petitioners argue, in either NTSB's regulations or a Guidance that NTSB gave petitioners as parties to the investigation. Nothing in the regulations speaks to the rights petitioners seek to enforce, and the Guidance is not a source of law enforceable against NTSB. Petitioners point to a handful of regulations that they argue create a right to information, but they are grabbing at straws. 49 C.F.R. 831.11(a), which states that NTSB shall only appoint parties who can provide suitable qualified technical personnel actively to assist in the investigation, does not, as petitioners argue, require NTSB to provide parties with all the facts of an investigation. Rather, the regulation speaks only to qualifications necessary to become a party: The corporation or individual must provide someone who has the time and expertise to assist the investigation. Likewise, 831.11(a)(4), which provides that the FAA and other qualified entities will have the same rights and privileges ... as other parties does not itself provide rights to any party. Finally, 831.14(a) cannot, as petitioners argue, endow parties with any rights, because it merely says that [a]ny person ... may submit to the Board written proposed findings to be drawn from the evidence produced during the course of the investigation. 49 C.F.R. 831.14(a) (1998) (emphasis added). 36 Petitioners' most noteworthy argument rests on part four of the NTSB Guidance that is given to all parties to an investigation. The Guidance says that [a]ll factual information and developments of the investigation that are made known to the [Investigator in Charge] will be passed to each party spokesman. Guidance, reprinted in Br. for Respondents at 2c. Petitioners maintain that, pursuant to this statement in the agency's Guidance, they have a legal right to information. Petitioners' problem, however, is that the Guidance does not establish a binding legal norm. 37 Petitioners argue that the Guidance is binding on the Board, because it is incorporated into the Board's regulations.Petitioners' attempt to demonstrate this incorporation at oral argument was, as they acknowledged, convoluted. Counsel argued that 831.11(b) requires parties to sign a Statement of Party Representatives to NTSB Investigation, and the Statement then connects to the Guidance, which contains the sentence endowing them with a right to the information. In their brief, petitioners simplified the route and argued instead that the Party Statement itself spells out Petitioners' rights and the procedures NTSB would follow, and promised Petitioners full participation and sharing in all pertinent factual developments and deliberations. Joint Br. for Petitioners at 11. Both versions are wrong. 38 The Party Statement gives petitioners no rights. It is a one-page document that discusses their duties as parties and requires them to waive their right to assert privilege in litigation with respect to information or documents obtained during the course of the investigation. It does not discuss their rights as parties, let alone promise[ ] Petitioners full participation and sharing in all pertinent factual developments. It entitles petitioners to nothing. Neither does the Party Statement incorporate the Guidance. The Party Statement makes no reference--either explicitly or implicitly--to the Guidance. Thus, there is no link between the Board's regulations and the Guidance. 39 Without that link, the Guidance is not a source of law; rather it is exactly what it appears to be, a hand-out that gives information, not rights, to parties in an NTSB investigation. While some unpublished agency pronouncements can be binding, not every piece of paper emanating from a Department or Independent Agency is a regulation. Piccone v. United States, 407 F.2d 866, 877 (Ct. Cl. 1969) (Nichols, J., concurring). The general test is whether the agency intended to bind itself with the pronouncement. See Padula v. Webster, 822 F.2d 97, 100 (D.C. Cir. 1987). Agency intent is ascertained by an examination of the provision's language, its context, and any available extrinsic evidence.Doe v. Hampton, 566 F.2d 265, 281 (D.C. Cir. 1977). Here, petitioners make no showing, and we can find none, that NTSB intended the Guidance to be binding. 40 NTSB certainly never has stated an intention to be bound by the Guidance. See Service v. Dulles, 354 U.S. 363, 373-74, 377-82 (1957) (finding departmental regulations to be binding where the agency explicitly adopted the regulations to bind its discretion). Indeed, we cannot imagine why NTSB would ever limit its ability to collect and digest information as it sees fit. The agency is not in the business of facilitating private investigations by private parties, so it would make no sense for NTSB to bind itself to serve as a repository of information for private parties who are angling to protect their interests in litigation. The Guidance simply indicates that, during an investigation, parties may share in some information gathered by the Board; however, the Guidance guarantees nothing. 41 Manuals or procedures may be binding on an agency when they affect individuals' rights. See Morton v. Ruiz, 415 U.S. 199, 235 (1974) (holding that an agency is bound by procedures in its manual where an individual's entitlement to government benefits was affected by procedures); Massachusetts Fair Share v. Law Enforcement Assistance Admin., 758 F.2d 708, 711 (D.C. Cir. 1985) (holding that an agency is bound by regulations in its manual delineating procedures for grant-funding). But see Schweiker v. Hansen, 450 U.S. 785, 789 (1981) (declining to find internal rules set forth in a handbook binding where relief would have been inconsistent with a published regulation). Because an NTSB investigation does not itself determine the rights of the parties, see 49 C.F.R. 831.4 (Accident/incident investigations are fact finding proceedings.... [They] are not conducted for the purpose of determining the rights or liabilities of any person.), however, the Guidance cannot be viewed as a binding rule on these terms. 42 In sum, because NTSB has never indicated an intention to be bound by the Guidance and because the investigation does not affect petitioners' rights, the Guidance does not endow petitioners with any rights to seek the information at issue. Accordingly, they have not suffered any informational injury.