Case Detail
| Case Title | Shapiro v. United States Social Security Administration | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| District | District of Vermont | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| City | Burlington | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Number | 2:2019cv00238 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Filed | 2019-12-20 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Closed | 2022-03-30 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Judge | Judge Christina Reiss | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Plaintiff | Robert E. Shapiro | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Description | Robert Shapiro submitted a FOIA request to the Social Security Administration for records concerning guidance on SSA disability payments for migraine headaches. The agency acknowledged receipt of the request and gave Shapiro an estimated cost of $2,908 for processing his request. Shapiro submitted the payment. However, according to Shapiro, the agency only responded to two-thirds of the items listed in his request. Shapiro filed an administrative appeal of the agency's response. After hearing nothing further from the agency, Shapiro filed suit. Complaint issues: Failure to respond within statutory time limit, Fees - Advance Payment, Litigation - Attorney's fees | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Defendant | Commissioner of Social Security | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Defendant | United States Social Security Administration | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Appeal | Second Circuit 22-1191 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Documents | Docket Complaint Complaint attachment 1 Complaint attachment 2 Complaint attachment 3 Complaint attachment 4 Complaint attachment 5 Complaint attachment 6 Opinion/Order [25] FOIA Project Annotation: A federal court in Vermont has ruled that the Social Security Administration has shown that Dr. Robert Shapiro's FOIA request for records concerning payments for headache treatment is too broad to be processed. Shapiro was a medical doctor and professor of neurological sciences at the school of medicine at the University of Vermont. The agency initially assessed Shapiro a fee of $2,908, which he agreed to pay. The agency then disclosed two memoranda and told Shapiro it was withholding 1,377 pages in total under Exemption 5 (privileges) and Exemption 6 (invasion of privacy). After reviewing the two memoranda, Shapiro found they were not relevant. He then filed an administrative appeal of the denial and the fee assessment. The agency decided to conduct another search, which located 1,581,644 responsive pages that would require 193.311 hours to review and would cost $7 million. After Shapiro filed suit, the agency argued that he failed to exhaust his administrative remedies. The court rejected that claim, noting that "here, Defendant opted to respond to Plaintiff's FOIA request by producing two memoranda and withholding 1,377 pages of responsive documents under Exemptions 5 and 6. Although Defendants may have been under no obligation to process Plaintiff's FOIA request, it chose to do so and made no initial claim that it was unreasonably broad or burdensome." The court added that "even if Plaintiff's FOIA request was not perfected, Defendant's untimely response to it served as a waiver of its exhaustion defense." But the court agreed that the agency had shown that Shapiro's request was too broad. The court pointed out that "on its face, Plaintiff's FOIA request had no time limits, no document type limitations, no custodian limitations, no geographic locations, and encompassed numerous subject matters. It extends not only to documents within Defendant's offices but also between Defendant and all 'offices of other Federal Government agencies.' It was therefore clearly unreasonably broad in the breadth of records it sought." Shapiro also challenged the agency's fee assessment, arguing that because the agency had missed statutory deadlines, it was no longer entitled to collect fees related to the request. The agency argued that because a separate fee-setting regime applied, it could still assess fees. The court agreed with Shapiro, pointing out that "Defendant's interpretation would render the 2007 Amendment superfluous because it would allow an agency to charge fees regardless of whether it complied with FOIA deadlines, providing it could cite a separate statute setting fees. Defendant is therefore prevented from assessing a fee when it fails to comply with FOIA time requirements unless there is an exception." The court also sympathized with Shapiro's request for litigation costs but indicated that the court would need to hear more from the agency about its reasons for making its exemption claims before a final ruling on the issue of costs.
Opinion/Order [40]Issues: Choice of format - Burdensome FOIA Project Annotation: A federal court in Vermont has reduced the attorney's fees awarded to Robert Shapiro by 50 percent to reflect his limited success. Although Shapiro's request to the Social Security Administration was broad and his success limited, the court found that the reasons for bringing his request 'were scholarly and sought to improve access to benefits for people with disabilities" and because SSA had engaged in "obdurate behavior," the court held that "partial award of reasonable attorney's fees and costs to Plaintiff is warranted." The court found that an appropriate rate for Shapiro's two attorneys was $185 an hour and $270 an hour respectively. The court then reduced the number of hours claimed by 50 percent, noting that "because the billing records lack the specificity necessary to identify specific hours to be eliminated, the court must adopt the latter approach. The court agrees with SSA that a reduction of fifty percent is required based upon Plaintiff's limited success and failure to achieve his ultimate objective in this case â€" production of the responsive records." The court awarded Shapiro's attorneys a total of $10,262. The court also awarded $445 in fees and indicated that since $2,908 in fees Shapiro had paid in advance had already been returned as part of the original settlement, it was no longer a part of the case.
Issues: Litigation - Attorney's fees - Entitlement - Calculation of award | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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