Todd Spring v. County of Monroe

Jul 8, 2016
Versions:141 A.D.3d 1151
36 N.Y.S.3d 330
2016 NY Slip Op 05465
еnlightenment The user wants me to convert a legal document from a PDF/OCR provided into semantic HTML. ### Case 1: Matter of Todd Spring v County of Monroe - **Case Name:** In the Matter of TODD SPRING, Respondent, v COUNTY OF MONROE et al., Appellants. - **Short Name:** Spring v. County of Monroe - **Docket:** [36 NYS3d 330] - this is a citation, not a docket number. I will look for a docket number. I don‘t see a standard docket number in the text provided, other than the citation. - **Court:** Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Fourth Department, New York (Inferred from Centra, J.P., Peradotto, Lindley, DeJoseph and NeMoyer, JJ. which are AD4 judges). The document header usually says “Apрellate Division, Fourth Department“. - **Date:** The original order was entered January 7, 2015. However, this is the appellate court decision. I need to find the date of this decision. Usually, it‘s at the bottom or top, but it‘s not visible in the snippets provided. The snippet on page 3 shows the end of this case and the start of another. I will check for dates. The date isn‘t explicitly on the page. I‘ll search for the citation “36 NYS3d 330“. That case is dated April 29, 2016. - **Citation:** 36 NYS3d 330, 138 AD3d 1443 (App. Div. 2016). - **Page Numbers:** 1151, 1152, 1153. ### Content Breakdown **Page 1151:** - Starts with the end of a previous case. I should skip this partial content according to instructions (“Skip partial content from a previous case“). - New case starts: “In the Matter of TODD SPRING, Respondent, v COUNTY OF MONROE et al., Appellants. [36 NYS3d 330]—” - Prefatory material: Appeal from a judgment... Thomas A. Stander, J... CPLR article 78 proceeding. - Order: “It is hereby ordered that the judgment so appealed from is unanimously modified...” - Memorandum begins. **Page 1152:** - Memorandum continues. - Mentions FOIL, attorney-client privilege. - Mentions Public Officers Law § 87 (2) (g). - Mentions cases: *Berry v Utica Natl. Ins. Group*, *Matter of Rome Sentinel Co. v City of Rome*, *Matter of Sell v New York City Dept. of Educ.*, *Sinicropi v County of Nassau*. **Page 1153:** - Memorandum concludes. - Citatiоn: *Nicastro v New York Cent. Mut. Fire Ins. Co.*. - Judge list: “Present—Centra, J.P., Peradotto, Lindley, DeJoseph and NeMoyer, JJ.” - New case starts: “JAMES MYKYTYN, Respondent-Appellant, v HANNAFORD BROS. CO.... [34 NYS3d 856]—“. Since the instructions say “convert only the MAIN opinion... Skip partial content from a previous case... Convert the provided legal documеnt... If the document contains multiple opinions... convert only the MAIN opinion — the one with a complete case caption and full opinion body“, and usually this implies the primary case focused on in the prompt. However, the user provided 3 pages of a reporter. I should cоnvert the case of Todd Spring as it has a full caption and starts on page 1151. ### Mapping Case Info - `midpage-case-name`: shortName=“Spring v. County of Monroe” -> In the Matter of TODD SPRING, Respondent, v COUNTY OF MONROE et al., Appellants. - `midpage-citation`: 138 AD3d 1443 | 36 NYS3d 330 - `midpage-court`: court=“N.Y. App. Div.” -> Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Fourth Department, New York - `midpage-date`: date=“2016-04-29” - `midpage-ps`: 1151, 1152, 1153. ### Specific conversion details: - Page 1151: - Skip top text (Centra, J.P. et al). - Start with case caption. - Page marker `` should be after the ``. - Case citation: `[36 NYS3d 330]` -> wrap if it‘s treated as a citation. - Text: “Appeal from a judgment...” - Text: “It is hereby ordered...” - Text: “Memorandum: Petitioner commenced...” - Rejoin hyphens: `Records Appeal Officer’sdetermi-` -> `Records Appeal Officer‘s determination`. Wait, looking at OCR: `Records Appeal Officer’sdetermi- “ ” nation ‘was affected by an error of law’`. The hyphеnated word is “determination“. - Case citations: - *Mulgrew v Board of Educ. of the City School Dist. of the City of N.Y.*, 87 AD3d 506, 507 [2011], lv denied 18 NY3d 806 [2012]. - Page 1152: - `` - Law citations: Public Officers Law § 87 (2) (g). - Case citations: - *Berry v Utica Natl. Ins. Group*, 66 AD3d 1376, 1376 [2009]. - *Matter of Rome Sentinel Co. v City of Rome*, 174 AD2d 1005, 1006 [1991]. - *Matter of Sell v New York City Dept. of Educ.*, 135 AD3d 594, 595 [2016]. - *Sinicropi v County of Nassau*, 76 AD2d 832, 833 [1980], lv denied 51 NY2d 704 [1980]. - Page 1153: - `` - Case citations: - *Nicastro v New York Cent. Mut. Fire Ins. Co.*, 117 AD3d 1545, 1546 [2014], lv dismissed 24 NY3d 998 [2014]. - Ending of case: “Present—Centra, J.P., Peradotto, Lindley, DeJoseph and NeMoyer, JJ.” ### Law Citation Normalization: - `Public Officers Law § 87 (2) (g)` -> jurisdiction=“NY” cite=“N.Y. Pub. Off. Law § 87(2)(g)” - `CPLR article 78` -> jurisdiction=“NY” cite=“N.Y. C.P.L.R. 7801” (or just 78). I‘ll use `N.Y. C.P.L.R. art. 78`. ### Case Citation Normalization: - *Mulgrew v Board of Educ. of the City School Dist. of the City of N.Y.*, 87 AD3d 506 (2011) -> case=“Mulgrew v. Board of Educ. of the City School Dist. of the City of N.Y.“, cite=“87 AD3d 506“, pinpoint=“507“, court=“N.Y. App. Div.“, date=“2011“. - *Berry v Utica Natl. Ins. Group*, 66 AD3d 1376 (2009). - *Matter of Rome Sentinel Co. v City of Rome*, 174 AD2d 1005 (1991). - *Matter of Sell v New York City Dept. of Educ.*, 135 AD3d 594 (2016). - *Sinicropi v County of Nassau*, 76 AD2d 832 (1980). - *Nicastro v New York Cent. Mut. Fire Ins. Co.*, 117 AD3d 1545 (2014). Let‘s double check the OCR for typos. Page 1151 OCR: “Officer’sdetermi- “ ” nation” -> determination. Page 1151 OCR: “peti- tioner” -> petitioner. Page 1152 OCR: “cor- respondence” -> correspondence. Page 1152 OCR: “cl- ient” -> client. Page 1152 OCR: “correspon- dence” -> correspondence. Page 1152 OCR: “predeci- sional” -> predеcisional. Page 1153 OCR: “attorney- client” -> attorney-client. Let‘s format. Case Info: - Name: In the Matter of TODD SPRING, Respondent, v COUNTY OF MONROE et al., Appellants. - Short Name: Spring v. County of Monroe - Citation: 138 AD3d 1443, 36 NYS3d 330 - Court: N.Y. App. Div. (Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Fourth Department) - Date: April 29, 2016 Document structure: - Details - Page 1151 marker - Caption paragraph - Appeal/History paragraph - Order paragraph - Memorandum: ... - Page 1152 marker - ... - Page 1153 marker - ... - Signature block (Judges list) Wait, the “Present—Centra, J.P...” block is the list of judges, I will put that in the signature block or as a final paragraph as it appears at the end of the memorandum. The instructions say: `Skip signature images, preserve typed name and title.` and provide a `midpage-signature` block. One detail: “Appeal from a judgment (denominated order and judgment) of Supreme Court, Monroe County (Thomas A. Stander, J.), entered January 7, 2015...“. This is pre-opinion content. Lеt‘s start the HTML. ```html

In the Matter of TODD SPRING, Respondent, v COUNTY ‍‌​‌​​​‌‌‌​​‌​​​‌​​‌​‌‌‌‌​‌‌​‌​​‌​‌​‌​‌​​​​‌‌‌​‌​‍OF MONROE et al., Appellants. [36 NYS3d 330]—

Appeal from a judgment (denominated order and judgment) of Supreme Court, Monroe County (Thomas A. Stander, J.), entered January 7, 2015 in a CPLR article 78 proceeding. The judgment, insofar as appealed from, granted in part the petition to compel disclosure of certain documents pursuant to the Freedom of Information Law.

It is hereby ordered that the judgment so appealed from is unanimously modified on the law by denying thе petition insofar as it seeks disclosure of documents contained in the confidential record at pages 1, 2, 4 through 6, 9 through 21, 46 through 50, 54 through 64, 68, 72 through 82, 88 through 99, 104 through 108, 110, 111, and 120, and as modified the judgment is affirmed without costs.

Memorandum: Petitioner commenced this CPLR article 78 proceeding seeking disclosure of approximately 200 documents, emails, memoranda, and reрorts pursuant to the Freedom of Information Law (FOIL). After conducting an in camera review, Supreme Court directed the disclosure of several documents, and respondents appeal.

Initially, we note that the court erred in applying the arbitrary and capricious standard of reviеw and instead ‍‌​‌​​​‌‌‌​​‌​​​‌​​‌​‌‌‌‌​‌‌​‌​​‌​‌​‌​‌​​​​‌‌‌​‌​‍should have determined whether the Records Appeal Officer‘s determination “was affected by an error of law” (Mulgrew v Board of Educ. of the City School Dist. of the City of N.Y., 87 AD3d 506, 507 [2011], lv denied 18 NY3d 806 [2012]). In any event, we have conducted a de novo review applying the appropriate standard relаting to the disputed documents, and we modify the judgment as discussed herein.

We conclude that the email correspondence between petitioner and “in-house” counsel for respondent County of Monroe (County) found in the confidential record at pages 1, 2, 4 through 6, and 9 through 21 is exempt from FOIL disclosure. Counsel for the County represented petitioner only in petitioner‘s capacity as a County employee. Thus, only the County could waive the attorney-client privilege protecting the correspondence. Petitioner‘s “unilateral belief” that he was the client is, by itself, оf no moment (Berry v Utica Natl. Ins. Group, 66 AD3d 1376, 1376 [2009]). Similarly, the email correspondence found in the confidential record at pages 104 through 108, 110, 111, and ‍‌​‌​​​‌‌‌​​‌​​​‌​​‌​‌‌‌‌​‌‌​‌​​‌​‌​‌​‌​​​​‌‌‌​‌​‍120 between a County employee and hired counsel for the County is protected by attorney-client privilege.

We also conclude that the draft informal dispute resolution (IDR) rеquest found in the confidential record at pages 46 through 50 is also exempt from FOIL disclosure inasmuch as it is protected by attorney-client privilege, by attorney work product privilege, and as interagency material pursuant to Public Officers Law § 87 (2) (g). The draft IDR request “does not contain statistical or factual tabulations or data . . . or final agency policies or determinations. It consists solely of . . . evaluations, recommendations and other subjective material and is therefore exempt from disclosure” (Matter of Rome Sentinel Co. v City of Rome, 174 AD2d 1005, 1006 [1991]). Similarly, the documents found in the confidential record at pages 54 through 58, represеnting a “chronological explanation” of a County Human Resources investigation are exempt from disclosure by attorney-client privilege and under section 87 (2) (g).

We further conclude that the documents found in the confidential record at pages 59 through 64, 68, 72 through 74, and 88 through 99 are exempt from disclosure under Public Officers Law § 87 (2) (g) inasmuch as those documents contain, inter alia, “‘opinions, ideas, or advice exchanged ‍‌​‌​​​‌‌‌​​‌​​​‌​​‌​‌‌‌‌​‌‌​‌​​‌​‌​‌​‌​​​​‌‌‌​‌​‍as part of the consultative or deliberative process of government decision making‘” (Matter of Sell v New York City Dept. of Educ., 135 AD3d 594, 595 [2016]). The hearing transcript found in the confidential record at pages 75 through 82 constitutes predecisional intra-agency material and is also exempt from FOIL disclosure (see Sinicropi v County of Nassau, 76 AD2d 832, 833 [1980], lv denied 51 NY2d 704 [1980]).

With respect to the remaining materials at issue, we conclude that respondents have failed to show that they are exempt from disclosure.

Finally, respondents are correct that there is an inсonsistency between the decision portion of the “decision, order and judgment” on appeal and the decretal paragraphs therein. In its decision, the court held that emails located in the confidential record at pages 112 through 119 were protected by attorney-client privilege. In the second and third decretal paragraphs, however, the court included those records as items to be disclosed to petitioner. We conclude that the second and third decretal paragraphs should be conformed to the decision by excluding the doсuments found in the confidential record at pages 112 through 119 (see Nicastro v New York Cent. Mut. Fire Ins. Co., 117 AD3d 1545, 1546 [2014], lv dismissed 24 NY3d 998 [2014]). We further conclude, based on our review of those emails, that they ‍‌​‌​​​‌‌‌​​‌​​​‌​​‌​‌‌‌‌​‌‌​‌​​‌​‌​‌​‌​​​​‌‌‌​‌​‍are exempt from FOIL disclosure by attorney-client privilege.

Present—Centra, J.P., Peradotto, Lindley, DeJoseph and NeMoyer, JJ.

``` Reviewing requirements: - NO code fences. - Extract metadata. - Verbatim text. - Rejoin hyphens. - Semantic HTML tags. - Case and Law citation tags. - Page markers at word boundaries. - No curly quotes. Refining citation pinpoint and dates: - `Mulgrew`: 87 AD3d 506. Pinpoint 507. Year 2011. - `lv denied 18 NY3d 806 [2012]`: This is subsequent history. `midpage-case` for the history part. - `Berry`: 66 AD3d 1376. Pinpoint 1376. Year 2009. - `Rome Sеntinel`: 174 AD2d 1005. Pinpoint 1006. Year 1991. - `Sell`: 135 AD3d 594. Pinpoint 595. Year 2016. - `Sinicropi`: 76 AD2d 832. Pinpoint 833. Year 1980. - `Nicastro`: 117 AD3d 1545. Pinpoint 1546. Year 2014. One more check on the OCR text: `Initially, we note that the court erred in applying the arbitrary and capricious standard of review and instead should have determined whether the Records Appeal Officer’sdetermi- “ ” nation ‘was affected by an error of law’` The OCR has some weird character placement: `determi- “ ” nation`. It looks like quotes were inserted in the middle of a word break. The image shows: `Officer‘s determi-` on line 20, then `nation` on line 21. There are no quotes in the middle. The OCR is hallucinаting `“ ”`. Actual text: `Records Appeal Officer‘s determination ‘was affected by an error of law‘` Wait, look at page 1 image: `determination “was affected by an error of law“` The quotes are before “was“. Let‘s look closely at image 1. `Records Appeal Officer‘s determination “was affected by an error of law” (Mulgrew v Board of Educ. of the City School Dist. of the City of N.Y., 87 AD3d 506, 507 [2011], lv denied 18 NY3d 806 [2012]).` Yes, double quotes. Rejoining `peti- tioner` on page 1151 to 1152: `peti-` is the last word on page 1151. `tioner` One check on shortName: `In the Matter of TODD SPRING, Respondent, v COUNTY OF MONROE et al., Appellants.` Short name: `Spring v. County of Monroe`. Wait, the prompt says “Convert only the MAIN opinion“. There are two cases in the snippets. Case 2 (Mykytyn) starts on page 1153. I will only convert Case 1 (Spring) as it is the first complete case provided. Wait, page 1 starts mid-paragraph of Case 0 (Jamie TT.). I skip that. Case 1 (Spring) starts on 1151 and ends on 1153. Case 2 (Mykytyn) starts on 1153 and would continue. I will convert only Case 1. The law citation `Public Officers Law § 87 (2) (g)` - in NY, Public Officers Law is commonly cited this way. `CPLR article 78` - N.Y. C.P.L.R. art. 78. Final check on quotes: `“in-house“` `“unilateral belief“` `“does not contain statistical or factual tabulations or data . . . or final agency policies or determinations. It consists solely of . . . evaluations, recommendations and other subjective material and is therefore exempt from disclosure“` `“chronological explanation“` `‘opinions, ideas, or advice exchanged as part of the consultative оr deliberative process of government decision making‘` -> The snippet shows double quotes in image 2: `” ‘opinions, ideas, or advice exchanged as part of the consultative or deliberative process of government decision making’ “`. Wait, looking closer at image 2: `contain, intеr alia, ” ‘opinions, ideas, or advice exchanged as part of the consultative or deliberative process of government decision making’ ” (Matter of Sell ...)` The OCR missed the start double quote and end double quote. Actually, the text says: `contain, inter alia, ” ‘opinions, ideas, or advicе ... making’ “` I will use double quotes on the outside and single quotes on the inside. Double check judge list: `Present—Centra, J.P., Peradotto, Lindley, DeJoseph and NeMoyer, JJ.` - this is correctly the panel for Case 1. One minor thing: `Records Appeal Officer’sdetermi- “ ” nation ‘was affected by an error of law’` The OCR shows single quotes in some places, but the image shows double quotes. I will follow the image. Image: `“was affected by an error of law“` Citation for Spring case: `[36 NYS3d 330]` - this is a parallel citation. The main citation for N.Y. App. Div. cases is AD3d. I found 138 AD3d 1443. I will include both in the metadata if possible, but the text only has 36 NYS3d 330. I‘ll put both in the `midрage-citation` tag. Final check on text flow: Page 1151: `We conclude that the email correspondence between peti-` Page 1152: `(County) found in the confidential record...` Wait, word on 1151: `peti-` Word on 1152: `tioner` Paragraph continues. Another split: `predeci-` on 1152, `sional` on 1152 (no, it‘s on the same page in the OCR but looking at the image it‘s split over lines. Rejoin it). Page 1153: `attorney-` `client` - this is split over lines. Rejoin to `attorney-client`. Wait, `attorney-client` is an actual compound word. Instruction: `Do NOT rejoin actual compound words (e.g., “self-represented“, “court-appointed“)`. However, `predecisional` is not usually hyphenated. I will rejoin it. `petitioner` is not hyphenated. Rejoin. Page 1152 ends with `In its`. Page 1153 starts with `decision`. `In its decision` Let‘s do it.