Hamdan v. United States Department of Justice
2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 14292
| 9th Cir. | 2015Background
- Plaintiffs (Hamdan, Hemdan, and ACLU SoCal) FOIA-requested records from multiple agencies about U.S. investigations and any U.S. role in Hamdan’s 2008 detention/torture in the U.A.E.; suit followed when agencies withheld or redacted records.
- State Department searched multiple offices and overseas posts but did not search the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs; produced many records and withheld others as exempt.
- FBI searched its Central Records System (CRS) and ELSUR indices, produced many pages, and withheld pages invoking Exemptions 1, 2, 5, 6, 7(C), 7(D), and 7(E); plaintiffs only contested Exemptions 1 and 7(E) on appeal.
- DIA located responsive records and withheld all under Exemptions 1, 2, 3, and 6; plaintiffs contested DIA’s Exemptions 1 and 3.
- District court granted summary judgment for agencies; Ninth Circuit affirmed adequacy of searches and most exemption invocations but vacated and remanded for a segregability analysis because the district court made no findings whether non-exempt material could be disclosed.
Issues
| Issue | Plaintiff's Argument | Defendant's Argument | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Adequacy of searches (FBI & State) | Searches were incomplete — FBI should have searched field offices, agent emails, and Legal Attaché files; State should have searched Political-Military Affairs. | Agencies searched the systems where responsive records would reasonably be found (CRS/ELSUR; multiple State offices and posts); no lead emerged requiring broader searches. | Searches were reasonably calculated and therefore adequate; summary judgment affirmed on adequacy. |
| Exemption 1 (classification) | Agency declarations insufficiently tailored; boilerplate explanations mask the basis for withholding. | Affidavits provided reasonably specific, plausible justifications and deference is owed in national-security context. | FBI and DIA met Exemption 1 burden; withheld material properly classified; deference applied. |
| Exemption 3 (DIA, 10 U.S.C. § 424) | §424 should be read narrowly (personnel/org only); country names with which DIA shares intelligence are not a protected "function." | §424 covers the DIA’s organization or any function, and naming partner countries would reveal DIA functions and harm intelligence-sharing. | §424 is an Exemption 3 withholding statute and covers the withheld material (including partner-country IDs); DIA’s withholding under §424 upheld. |
| Exemption 7(E) (FBI techniques) | FBI must show disclosure would risk circumvention or that techniques are non-public; some withheld items concern routine techniques. | Exemption 7(E) protects non-public techniques and procedures even absent a separate showing of circumvention risk for techniques (the risk clause modifies only guidelines). | FBI met its burden; withheld surveillance/credit-search techniques properly exempt under 7(E). |
| Segregability (release of non-exempt portions) | Agencies must identify and disclose all reasonably segregable, non-exempt portions; district court failed to make findings and redactions/withholdings appear overbroad. | Agencies submitted declarations and Vaughn indices; court may rely on sufficiently detailed agency declarations rather than in camera page-by-page review. | Vacated and remanded: district court must determine segregability (agency declarations adequate for some agencies but DIA’s declarations lacked sufficient detail for segregability findings). |
Key Cases Cited
- Wiener v. FBI, 943 F.2d 972 (9th Cir.) (agencies must provide document-specific explanations to enable meaningful adversarial challenge and segregability review)
- Lahr v. Nat’l Transp. Safety Bd., 569 F.3d 964 (9th Cir.) (standard for adequacy of FOIA search: reasonably calculated to uncover responsive documents)
- Hunt v. CIA, 981 F.2d 1116 (9th Cir.) (courts give substantial weight to good-faith agency affidavits in national-security FOIA withholding)
- Berman v. CIA, 501 F.3d 1136 (9th Cir.) (two-step FOIA summary-judgment review: factual basis then exemption applicability)
- Pac. Fisheries, Inc. v. United States, 539 F.3d 1143 (9th Cir.) (agency declaration may suffice for segregability if reasonably detailed)
- CIA v. Sims, 471 U.S. 159 (U.S.) (deference to executive judgments on national security and classification)