Good Day All.... Another Win for the Good Guys.

http://thefoiablog.typepad.com/the_foia_blog/2007/12/cia-loses.html

CIA Loses Case at DC Circuit

The CIA has had a lower court ruling reversed at the United States Circuit Court for the District of Columbia.

The CIA had previously won summary judgment on a case where requester Jefferson Morley sought records on George Joannides, a deceased CIA agent.

The Circuit Court however found that the CIA's search wasn't adequate as it hadn't search usually FOIA exempt operational files because in this case there was an exception that made these files non-exempt from the FOIA in their entirety. The Court remanded the case back to the lower court for the CIA to search its operational files. Further, the CIA was ordered to search JFK act files that it had transferred to NARA, but had admitted to keeping copies of as well as to sent to NARA but that aren't to be released to the public until 2017. Finally, the Court found the CIA's description of its search inadequate and remanded the case for a further explanation of the search.

While the Circuit Court found the CIA Vaughn Index adequate, it found the lower court did not make a segregability finding and remanded the case for it to do so. The Circuit Court also found that the CIA had properly justified its use of Exemptions 1, 3 and 7(E).

However, the Court found a number of deficiencies with other exemptions and remanded those portion of the case for further agency explanation. The Court found that as to Exemption 2, the CIA did not meet its burden in establishing its use of low-2 to withhold certain material and remanded for further explanation. Likewise, the Court found that the CIA's defense of it's glomar response was also inadequate and remanded that portion of the case for further explanation. Next, the Court found that the CIA's justification of Exemption 5 was inadequate, thus on remand the CIA will have to explain that exemption's use further. Finally, the Court also found that the CIA's justification of exemption 6 was inadequate as it never established that any privacy interest in the withheld records existed.

Here is the pdf format link to the judge's ruling....

http://pacer.cadc.uscourts.gov/docs/common/opinions/200712/06-5382a.pdf

Best Regards in Research,

Don

Don Roberdeau
U.S.S. John F. Kennedy, CV-67, "Big John," Plank Walker
Sooner, or later, The Truth emerges Clearly

http://members.aol.com/DRoberdeau/JFK/ROSEwillisANNOUNCEMENT.html

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T ogether
E veryone
A chieves
M ore

for the United States


"Drehm seemed to think the shots came from in FRONT OF or BESIDE the President."

(My EMPHASIS)

Charles F. Brehm, a combat gunfire experienced, United States Army Ranger, World War II, D-Day veteran, & very close Dealey Plaza attack witness, quoted just minutes after the attack, and while he was still standing within Dealey Plaza (11-22-63 "Dallas Times Herald," where his last name was spelled “Drehm”; Brehm’s interview was printed in only the fifth & final edition that day)

"I looked towards the top of the terrace to my right as the sound of the shots seemed to come from that direction."

Forest V. Sorrels, Dealey Plaza attack witness & Secret Service (Dallas Office) Special Agent In Charge, his report dated November 28, 1963: also Warren Commission Volume 21 page 548 (at the attack start, Sorrels car riding location was just past the Franzen family members, approximately 140' in front of President Kennedy, and exactly even with the grassy knoll picket fence corner, directly to his right)

"I remarked to Mr. Campbell who was standing near by that I thought the shots had come from our building, but I heard someone else say 'No, I think it was further down the street.' "

Jeraldean "Carolyn" Reid, Dealey Plaza attack witness, who stood directly in front of the warrenatti-apologists, supposed, “lone nut” "snipers lair," in her earliest 11-23-63 Dallas Police Department affidavit (Warren Commission Exhibit #2003, Warren Commission Volume 24 page 223)

=
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

Better to light a candle,
than, curse the darkness.

"He who passively accepts evil
is as much involved with it
as he who helps to perpetuate it."
(Martin Luther King)

Fantastic news. I'm amazed.

Way to go Jim Lesar and Jeff Morley! Thank you!

But, we don't have those files yet. Keep fighting.

Joe Backes

I am amazed too. I'm hoping this holds up but CIA will certainly appeal. Just too bad most judges run like scared bunnies before the CIA.

T.

Here's a pdf of the Court's decision for anyone wanting the full story:

http://pacer.cadc.uscourts.gov/docs/common/opinions/200712/06-5382a.pdf

Hmmmm, I think the black hiliters are coming out...

T.

Don't you just love it when they give you the "redacted version" of the document, where the only remaining words are "is" or "and" ? <laughing>

Ooops!

Jeff Morley has filed an update of this. Gee, that Mr. Posner is so hard on CIA!

"Court orders CIA to search for JFK records"
By Jefferson Morley

Last week, the CIA admitted that it had destroyed key evidence in the case of al-Qaeda leader Abu Zubudaya, triggering denunciations from congressional leaders and legal authorities who said the agency was behaving lawlessly.


Two days later, a three-judge panel in the U.S. Court of Appeals ordered the agency to search for long-suppressed files related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963. The judges said the CIA had to search the files of a deceased Miami-based intelligence who hid what he knew about accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald from investigators.

"The CIA has not changed its ways since JFK," said author Gerald Posner, a Huffington Post contributor, who has written about the Abu Zubadayah case. He is also the author of a book on Kennedy's assassination.

The appellate court ruling marked an unusual setback for the agency. "FOIA decisions against the CIA are relatively rare," notes Secrecy News.

"To paraphrase Ricky Ricardo," said the FOIA Blog, "it looks like the CA has "lot's of 'xplaining to do."

That was the gist of Judge Judith Rogers' 31-page decision in my Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit seeking records of George Joannides, a career undercover officer. At the time of Kennedy's murder, Joannides served as chief of psychological warfare operations in south Florida. He also served as the CIA's liaison to congressional JFK investigators in 1978. He died in 1990.

Rogers, joined by two colleagues, rejected the CIA's argument that it had no obligation to search for documents about Joannides in the files of its secret operations in 1963. During oral arguments in October, the judges had grilled Agency lawyer about this claim. In their decision, the judges ruled that the law required a search of sensitive operational files, something the agency almost always resists.

The judges also said that the Agency had not adequately explained the whereabouts of monthly reports filed by Joannides in 1963.

In August 1963, Joannides was secretly funding a Cuban exile group whose members clashed repeatedly with Oswald, an ex-Marine and supporter of Cuban communist leader Fidel Castro. When Kennedy was killed in Dallas, apparently by Oswald, three months later, the group used CIA funds to publicize these contacts and blame the assassination on Castro.

The CIA did not reveal Joannides' financial relationship to the accused assassin's antagonists to the Warren Commission, which investigated the crime and concluded Oswald acted alone. Joannides' reports on his actions in 1963 have never surfaced.

"On remand the CIA must supplement its explanation" of why the reports cannot be found, the court ruled.

The judges ordered lower court Judge Richard Leon to supervise the implementation of its order, a process that is expected to take several months.

"The CIA has constantly been an active leader in hiding, distorting, and sometimes destroying evidence on key issues affecting our history and lives," Posner said in an email.

That's a harsh judgment but it is more plausible today than it was before the Abu Zubadayah revelations and the Rogers decision."

I really disagree with this last sentence. The revelations of CIA criminality have been ongoing for almost 40 years now! These two recent decisions only added to the mountain of evidence we already have!

I have plodded through the decision myself, and it seems to me CIA can still win if they can just make further explanations to satisfy the judge. What I can't understand, is just why CIA is allowed such latitude to decide what should be released! It's time the files were reviewed by a court or someone else.

T.