Justia U.S. D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Appellant sought attorneys' fees following his largely unsuccessful attempt to obtain documents from the FHFA under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552 et seq. The court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion in determining that, even if appellant were eligible for attorneys' fees, he was not entitled to them. The court found no abuse of discretion in the district court's assessment of each of the factors of the entitlement inquiry and affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "McKinley v. FHFA" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against her former law firm alleging that decisions made by the firms' directors who administered the retirement plan breached their fiduciary duties under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), 29 U.S.C. 1001 et seq. The court concluded that ERISA's adoption of the common law's standard of fiduciary care in section 1104(a)(1)(B) permitted prudent fiduciaries making important decisions to rely on the advice of counsel in appropriate circumstances. Therefore, the court affirmed the district court's conclusion that the directors rightfully relied upon the advice of the plan's lawyer. View "Clark v. Feder Semo and Bard, P.C., et al." on Justia Law

This case arose after the IRS Office of Chief Counsel and the National Treasury Employees Union renegotiated their collective bargaining agreement. At issue on appeal was the Authority's interpretation of section 7106 of the Federal Service Labor Management Relations Statute, 5 U.S.C. 7101 et seq. When an agency asserts that a contract provision falls outside section 7106(b)(3)'s exception to section 7106(a), whether the question concerns the agency's duty to bargain, or the provision's consistency with law, the underlying issue is precisely the same: does the provision represent a appropriate arrangement. In applying two different standards in these contexts, the court concluded that the Authority set forth two inconsistent interpretations of the very same statutory term. Therefore, the Authority acted arbitrarily and capriciously and, therefore, the court vacated and remanded for further proceedings. View "U.S. Dept. of the Treasury v. FLRA" on Justia Law

Plaintiff appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of defendant, concluding that plaintiff's whistleblower complaint did not qualify as a "mixed case" complaint capable of triggering the savings clause under 5 U.S.C. 7702(f). Plaintiff argued that even though he presented his Title VII claim in the wrong forum (the MSPB), because he did so along with a timely filed IRA as part of a "mixed case," his formal EEO complaint should be deemed timely with the correct forum (the DOL) under section 7702(f)'s savings clause. The court affirmed the judgment because plaintiff's formal Title VII claim - filed well after the expiration of the EEO route's 15-day deadline - was untimely where the savings clause excused errors only in the place, not time, of filing. View "Schlottman v. Perez" on Justia Law

EFF appealed the district court's denial of its Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552 et seq., request for disclosure of a legal opinion prepared for the FBI by the OLC. The court held that the opinion, which was requested by the FBI in response to the OIG's investigation into its information-gathering techniques, was protected by the deliberative process privilege; the FBI did not adopt the opinion and thereby waive the deliberative process privilege; and because the entire opinion was exempt from disclosure under the deliberative process privilege, the court need not decide whether particular sections were properly withheld as classified or whether some material was reasonably segregable from the material properly withheld. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Electronic Frontier Found. v. Dept. of Justice" on Justia Law