Piccone v. U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, No. 15-536, 2015 WL 6499687 (E.D. Va. Oct. 27, 2015) (Cacheris, J.)

Piccone v. U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, No. 15-536, 2015 WL 6499687 (E.D. Va. Oct. 27, 2015) (Cacheris, J.)

Re: Request for records concerning investigation of plaintiff’s conduct

Disposition: Granting defendant's motion for summary judgment

• Procedural Requirements, Adequacy of Search:  "[T]he Court grants Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment."  The court finds that, "[w]hile this search was 'limited to only those individuals involved in the investigation into [plaintiff's] misconduct,' it was also 'expansive enough to encompass all of the individuals most likely to contain responsive information.'"  In response to plaintiff's objections, the court finds that "'the FOIA does not require a perfect search, only a reasonable one.'"  Additionally, the court finds that "[p]laintiff’s conclusory assertion that the USPTO’s selected search terms were unreasonable is not sufficient to overcome the 'presumption of good faith' to which Agency affidavits are entitled."  The court relates that "[p]laintiff flatly challenges the . . . USPTO’s search terms as unreasonable because they did not include a search for just his initials or a search for his patent bar registration number."