Ryan v. FBI, No. 14-1422, 2015 WL 4181033 (D.D.C. July 10, 2015) (Chutkan, J.)

Ryan v. FBI, No. 14-1422, 2015 WL 4181033 (D.D.C. July 10, 2015) (Chutkan, J.)

Re: Request for plaintiff's FBI file

Disposition: Granting in part and denying in part without prejudice defendant's motion for summary judgment

• Procedural Requirements, Searching for Responsive Records:  First, the court addresses plaintiff's argument "that the FBI was required to conduct a search for records held by any and all federal agencies" and finds that "[n]othing in the record suggests that the FBI has transferred any of its records to a government contractor for records management, or that any documents so transferred would not have been found in the searches described above," and also that "FOIA . . . requires only that the agency search for and produce documents in its possession, not search for records across the entire federal government."  Second, the court addresses plaintiff's argument that the FBI failed to search certain records systems and that "in other cases . . . the FBI has . . . strategically stored files in unindexed drives in order to avoid disclosure obligations in criminal discovery and FOIA."  In response, the court finds that "[g]iven the lack of responsive documents in the comprehensive record systems, . . . it was reasonable to conclude that searching less comprehensive records systems . . . was unnecessary" and also that "prior acts of bad faith do 'not defeat the presumption of good faith in all subsequent cases.'"  Third, the court addresses plaintiff's argument that the FBI failed to search one field office and finds that "[g]iven the universal nature of the records systems that were searched, there is no reason to believe that documents created, or physically located, in field offices would not have been indexed in those records systems."  However, although the court finds that "[t]he FBI has unquestionably now searched the [Central Records System] with all reasonable permutations of Plaintiff's name," the court finds that "[b]ecause the court is without evidence to conclude that a search [of the Electronic Surveillance Indices] was conducted in such a way that the name on Plaintiff's government-issued identification was included in the search, summary judgment is denied as to this search."