Case Detail
| Case Title | JUDICIAL WATCH, INC. v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| District | District of Columbia | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| City | Washington, DC | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Number | 1:2017cv02682 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Filed | 2017-12-14 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Closed | 2019-03-11 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Judge | Judge Christopher R. Cooper | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Plaintiff | JUDICIAL WATCH, INC. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Description | Judicial Watch submitted a FOIA request to the Department of Justice for records concerning FBI Supervisor Peter Strzok's assignment to the special counsel's investigation and his subsequent reassignment. The agency acknowledged receipt of the request, but after hearing nothing further from the agency, Judicial Watch filed suit. Complaint issues: Failure to respond within statutory time limit, Adequacy - Search, Litigation - Vaughn index, Litigation - Attorney's fees | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Defendant | U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Documents | Docket Complaint Complaint attachment 1 Complaint attachment 2 Complaint attachment 3 Complaint attachment 4 Opinion/Order [15] FOIA Project Annotation: Judge Christopher Cooper has ruled that the FBI improperly narrowed a request from Judicial Watch for records concerning the assignment of former FBI Deputy Assistant Director Peter Strzok to work on Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and his subsequent reassignment to Human Resources. In response to Judicial Watch's request, the FBI searched Strzok's email account for records containing the terms "assignment," "reassignment," and "appointment" in conjunction with the phrase "special counsel." This search yielded 19 responsive pages and attachments and the FBI disclosed 13 pages and withheld three entirely. Judicial Watch challenged the adequacy of the agency's search, arguing that its search was unreasonably narrow. Cooper agreed, pointing out that "this Court has noticed a pattern of. . .myopia plaguing FOIA reviewers in some of our federal agencies." Turning to the FBI's search in this case, Cooper noted that "here too, the FBI's search was overly cramped. Notwithstanding that Judicial Watch's requested referred to Mueller by name, the Bureau search only for the term 'special counsel.' But surely one would expect that Agent Strzok and other FBI personnel might use the Special Counsel's name â€" 'Mueller' â€" rather than his title when discussing Strzok's assignment to the Russian investigation, especially in informal emails. Another logical variation on 'special counsel' is its commonly used acronym 'SCO,' which appears to be used within the Special Counsel's Office itself, as reflected by the documents that the FBI uncovered and produced to Judicial Watch. Tellingly, the government used the acronym 'SCO' in its briefing in this case. The FBI's failure to search for these obvious synonyms and logical variations ran afoul of its obligation to construe FOIA requests liberally and conduct a search reasonably likely to produce all responsive documents." Cooper found the agency had improperly narrowed its search for emails by only searching Strzok's personal email account. Cooper observed that "surely, however, other people within the Bureau are likely to have discussed the assignment or reassignment via email without having shared those discussions with Strzok." Cooper pointed out that Strzok was a highly-regarded agent who had recently worked on two high-profile investigations. He noted that "common sense suggests that some of this discussion likely took place in emails exchanged by Agent Strzok's supervisors and other FBI officials involved in those decisions." Questioning the agency's decision to limit its search to Strzok's email account only, Cooper indicated that "because one would naturally expect others to have engaged in those communications, including without looping in Strzok, it was not reasonable (let alone eminently so) to search only Agent Strzok's emails." The FBI supported the adequacy of searching only Strzok's emails by explaining that it found no leads during its search that would have suggested a need to search elsewhere. But Cooper observed that "the purported absence of 'leads' in Agent Strzok's emails does not suggest the absence of other responsive emails: it comes as no surprise that colleagues who communicated with Strzok about the assignment might not indicate to him that they were communicating with others about the same topic." Cooper also found fault with the agency's decision not to search for text messages. Cooper noted that "the Court disagrees, at least with respect to Agent Strzok's documented use of text messages. Given that use, it strikes the Court as reasonably likely that he discussed his assignment to the Special Counsel's Office in text messages â€" which again is the standard for assessing an agency's selection of search locations."
Issues: Search - Reasonableness of search | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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