O’Brien v. DOJ, No. 22-2335, 2023 WL 2770824 (3d Cir. Apr. 4, 2023) (per curiam)

O’Brien v. DOJ, No. 22-2335, 2023 WL 2770824 (3d Cir. Apr. 4, 2023) (per curiam)

Re:  Request for records concerning requester’s criminal case that reference his co-defendant

Disposition:  Affirming district court’s grant of government’s motion for summary judgment

• Exemption 3; Exemption 7(D); Exemption 6; Exemption 7(C); Exemption 7(A); Exemption 7(E); Litigation Considerations:  “[The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit] will affirm the District Court’s judgment.”  First, “[the court] agree[s] with the DOJ that the brief does not argue that the District Court lacked an adequate factual basis for its determination.”  “Turning to the second step of [its] review, [the court finds that] the District Court’s 19-page opinion accompanying its summary-judgment order examined the exemptions invoked by the DOJ and cogently explained why the agency had met its burden of demonstrating that each of those exemptions applies here.”  “[The requester] has failed to establish that the District Court clearly erred in its determination.”  “Although [the requester] appears to claim that the Supreme Court’s decision in United States Department of Justice v. Landano, 508 U.S. 165 (1993), stands for the proposition that an agency may not withhold any information about a confidential source if that source testifies at trial, [the requester] is mistaken.”