Walsh v. Dep’t of the Navy, No. 23-04164, 2024 WL 4043657 (D.S.D. Sept. 4, 2024) (Schulte, J.)
Walsh v. Dep’t of the Navy, No. 23-04164, 2024 WL 4043657 (D.S.D. Sept. 4, 2024) (Schulte, J.)
Re: Request for letters of reprimand and disciplinary records for two now-retired general officers that plaintiff alleges tried to murder him in 1985
Disposition: Denying defendant’s motion to dismiss
- Litigation Considerations, Mootness and Other grounds for Dismissal: The court relates that “Defendants moved to dismiss [plaintiff’s] complaint asserting that, pursuant to the Department of Defense Manual 5400.07 6.3(b)(8), an agency can deny FOIA requests without citing an exemption when the request is duplicative.” “[Plaintiff] contends that he properly stated a claim because the Navy withheld documents without citing to one of FOIA’s nine enumerated exemptions.” “As an initial matter, this Court disagrees with Defendants’ contention that [plaintiff] abandoned his FOIA claim.” “To the contrary, [plaintiff] asserted the Navy did not properly list a FOIA exemption.” “Defendants cite no case allowing agencies to refuse to disclose records without asserting one of FOIA’s nine exemptions.” “Because the United States Supreme Court has expressly declined to ‘read into the FOIA a disclosure exemption that Congress did not itself provide[,]’ . . . [the] Court must do the same.” “[Plaintiff] claims the Navy withheld documents without asserting any of the nine enumerated exemptions in the FOIA statute.” “Accepting [plaintiff’s] factual allegations as true and construing all inferences in his favor, this Court finds that [plaintiff] has pled a plausible claim.”