Case Detail
| Case Title | WALLICK v. AGRICULTURAL MARKETING SERVICE | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| District | District of Columbia | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| City | Washington, DC | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Number | 1:2016cv02063 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Filed | 2016-10-17 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date Closed | 2018-07-23 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Judge | Judge Rudolph Contreras | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Plaintiff | RICHARD S. WALLICK | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Case Description | Richard Wallick submitted a FOIA request to the Agricultural Marketing Service for records concerning an application submitted by the Organic Materials Review Commission. The agency acknowledged receipt of the request, but after hearing nothing further from the agency, Wallick filed suit. Complaint issues: Failure to respond within statutory time limit, Litigation - Attorney's fees, Adequacy - Search | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Defendant | AGRICULTURAL MARKETING SERVICE | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Documents | Docket Complaint Complaint attachment 1 Complaint attachment 2 Complaint attachment 3 Complaint attachment 4 Opinion/Order [27] FOIA Project Annotation: A recent ruling by Judge Rudolph Contreras dealing with Richard Wallick's request to the Agricultural Marketing Service provides an interesting discussion of the relative obligations of the agency and the requester to sufficiently clarify a request so that both parties agree on the substance of the request. Because in this instance the parties did not agree, the case is also an illustration of the consequences a requester may suffer for his failure to be clear. Wallick's attorney, David Stotter, requested records about the application for certification submitted by the Organic Materials Review Commission. Two weeks later, Stotter submitted a revised request, although the agency never admitted to receiving the correction and instead contacted Stotter confirming the request of his original request. Five weeks later, Stotter emailed the agency to check on the status of the request. The next day he spoke on the phone with AMS FOIA Officer Gregory Bridges. As a result of that conversation, Bridges emailed Stotter indicating that Wallick's request had been modified to encompass the complete OMRI application and AMS communications relating to the application and certification. Stotter responded three hours later, disagreeing that he had modified the request and clarifying that one item in the original request should be interpreted to include "any records pertaining to any follow-up actions by USDA as to the OMRI application to produce technical reports for NOSB's ISO 65 program." Bridges responded the next day, agreeing with Stotter that Wallick's request had not been modified and indicating that the first item in the request encompassed the full application and supporting documents so that OMRI could produce technical reports for NOSB's ISO 65 program, any communications relating to the processing of that application, and any communications related to OMRI's ISO 65 certification. The agency initially disclosed 88 pages in May 2016 and told Wallick it would complete processing the request by June 2016. However, the agency did not complete the request until December 2016, withholding some records under Exemption 5 (privileges) and Exemption 6 (invasion of privacy). Wallick challenged the adequacy of the agency's search primarily by arguing that the agency had improperly narrowed the scope of the request by limiting it to OMRI's application for certification and failing to provide records about its recertification. He also challenged the redaction of a single sentence under Exemption 5. Wallick argued that the inclusion of the term "follow-up actions," which appeared in Stotter's clarification emails, but not the original request, included records pertaining to recertification. Contreras disagreed, noting that "Mr. Wallick's FOIA request only included a request for OMRI's original application and not subsequent applications for recertification and documents related to those applications." Wallick argued that "the plain language of the parties' statement of what they understood the request to encompass clearly covers certification â€" meaning the state of being certified â€" since it covers any communication within the agency's possession 'relating to OMRI's ISO certification." Contreras pointed out that "plaintiff is correct that the word 'certification' could mean the state of being certified. However, it could also easily mean the process of being certified. Because the language in the parties' agreement is ambiguous, the Court cannot rely on the plain language of the agreement alone, and instead must look at the context in which the language is used." He noted that "the phrasing 'related to OMRI's ISO certification' did not originate from his FOIA request, but rather his and Mr. Bridges' joint interpretation of his FOIA request, which Mr. Wallick's attorney insisted was not a modification of the original FOIA request. The original request only requested documents relating to 'the complete application' OMRI submitted. At no point does it reference any subsequent applications or give any indication as to what other processes Mr. Wallick was interested in. Read in this context, the Court cannot conclude that the plain meaning of the agreement indicates that Mr. Wallick requested every document in AMS's possession related to the actions OMRI took to maintain its ISO certification." Wallick contended that his request was not specifically limited to the original application. Contreras indicated that "agencies must interpret FOIA requests liberally and reasonably, but they need not extend the meaning of the request to include things not asked for." He explained that "when Mr. Wallick asked for information regarding 'the application' and then insisted that his original FOIA request had not been modified through communications between Mr. Stotter and Mr. Bridges, AMS was not making a distinction between applications for certification and applications for recertification â€" Mr. Wallick was. The agency was simply reasonably interpreting his FOIA request, which asked for materials related to a single application." Contreras agreed with Wallick that the fact that the agency provided records containing audit and recertification materials and characterized them as responsive "does raise the question of how the agency originally interpreted the FOIA request. The agency now claims that it provided these documents out of generosity rather than any obligation under FOIA. If the agency believed this throughout the course of this litigation, it remains unclear why it did not specify this position in its releases to Mr. Wallick or in its motion for summary judgment." He observed that "however, the agency's seeming change in its interpretation of the FOIA request is of little consequence when determining the scope of this FOIA request, as it is this Court's duty to review the record de novo and therefore to interpret the scope of the FOIA request de novo. . .[T[he plain meaning of the FOIA request clearly indicates an interest in only a single application and the follow-up actions pertaining to that application. The clarification emails were specifically stated to not be modifications of the request, and therefore cannot be read to broaden the scope of the request." Having agreed with the agency's interpretation of Wallick's request, Contreras went on to find that the agency's search was deficient in several aspects. He pointed out that "here, the agency has not sufficiently demonstrated that there are no other locations or record systems that are also likely to hold the types of documents requested." Although the agency searched two network drives for emails, Contreras faulted the Bridges' affidavit, observing that "he conclusorily asserts that these were the only places likely to have responsive records, but he never explains why this is so. He never explains how OMRI's application would have made it onto either email system: for example, he never states that OMRI submitted its application by email rather than in paper form, or that it is common practice for AMS employees to email these kinds of applications to each other, thereby uploading them to the agency's email server. As such, AMS's statement that the two networks searched were the only places likely to have all responsive records is merely conclusory." He also found the agency's search insufficient because it had failed to search for other documents that should have been attached to OMRI's application. Contreras found that a sentence the agency had redacted from an email was not protected by the deliberative process privilege. He pointed out that "the redacted sentence is simply an off-hand comment from a supervisor to a subordinate employee about the potential effect of OMRI's decision to exclude the subordinate employee from an upcoming audit. It is not part of any identifiable deliberative process, nor does it appear to constitute a recommendation as to how the agency should proceed." Alternatively, the agency argued that the since the email was considered non-responsive, it could be withheld on that basis. But Contreras explained that "once an agency has deemed a document to be responsive and has produced it to the requester, regardless of whether it actually is or not, the agency may not redact the information without sufficiently justifying such redaction pursuant to one of FOIA's statutory exemptions."
Issues: Request - Specificity, Adequacy - Search, Exemption 5 - Privileges - Deliberative process privilege - Deliberative | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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