Information on Appeals Activities within the Department of Justice

1. A total of 1556 appeals were received by this office during calendar year 1976 pursuant to 5 U.S.C. 552(a)(6). Upon review of component's initial request determinations, the following 1166 appeal decisions resulted. Appeal statistics reflect the number of appeals for which the processing was completed during 1976. A number of the completed appeals were actually received in 1975 and carried into the next calendar year before final action was taken. There were 1135 appeals pending in this office as of December 31, 1976.

(a) 270 determinations were affirmed

(b) 89 determinations were reversed

(c) 532 determinations were modified and additional records released

(d) 275 appeal actions were administratively closed by this Office. These appeals included those which were prematurely submitted, cases in which no initial request had been submitted, appeals which were withdrawn by the submitter, appeals for records which were eventually released by the components [often with significant involvement by this Office in the decisonmaking process], and appeals from requests in which the requester failed adequately to identify records or no records were located.

 

2. The following exemptions under the Freedom of Information Act and Privacy Act were cited as justification for the action upon appeals that resulted in a denial [or partial denial] of access:

5 U.S.C. § 552(b) (1) 151
  (2) 461
  (3) 28
  (4) 1
  (5) 203
  (6) 42
  (7)(A) 53
  (7)(B) 10
  (7)(C) 525
  (7)(D) 499
  (7)(E) 108
  (7)(F) 167
     
5 U.S.C. § 552a (j)(2) 25
  (k)(1) 2
  (k)(5) 39

3. The following officials were responsible for the denial in whole or in part of records requested, and the number of instances of participation of each:


Edward H. Levi Attorney General 2
Harold R. Tyler, Jr Deputy Attorney General 799
Antonin Scalia Assistant Attorney General
Office of Legal Counsel		 1

The Director of the Office of Informaiton and Privacy Appeals is responsible for the handling of moot appeals and administrative closings of appeals.

4. In an effort to promote an effective and efficient administration of the Freedom of Information Act within the Department of Justice, the Office of Information and Privacy Appeals prepared a series of synopses of the applications, in the course of adjudicating administrative appeals, of exemptions one through four. These were distributed throughout the Department.1 They should prove to be valuable tools to the Departmental components for the guidance they offer on the application of the exemptions to particular factual situations. To permit an understanding of the Department's administration of the Freedom of Information Act, the synopses have also been made available to interested Members of Congress and the public.

In terms of results at the initial request level, the appeals process itself operates as one of the primary means of improving the procedures within the various components of the Department. A beneficial and long-term consequence of the frequent consultations between the staff of the Office of Information and Privacy Appeals and the personnel of the Freedom of Information and Privacy Units of the components have been consistently in the direction of greater initial releases.


1 The remaining synopses pertaining to exemptions 5, 6 and 7(A) through (F) were completed and distributed during February 1977.


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