A requester sued a school district claiming it violated FOIA by improperly redacting certain names and other information in a federal grand jury subpoena received
by the district. As part of its defense of the lawsuit, the school
district submitted an affidavit signed by the school board president stating that the district relied on an opinion by the U.S Attorney’s
Office stating that the grand jury subpoena was exempt from
disclosure under several exemptions in the federal FOIA statute, and that disclosure of the subpoena would violate federal law and interfere with a criminal
investigation. The circuit court ruled in favor of the school district, finding
that it did not violate FOIA, but ordered the school
district to disclose a copy of the subpoena with certain information
unredacted.

On appeal, the Appellate Court ruled that the circuit court erred in determining that the
school district properly redacted recipient names and other information
contained in the subpoena in Edgar
County Watchdogs v. Paris Union School District No. 95.

First, the Appellate Court held that the school district’s reliance on an opinion by the U.S.
Attorney’s Office was misplaced, because the request was
submitted to an Illinois public body under the Illinois FOIA statute, so
federal FOIA’s statutory exemptions were inapplicable to this request.

Second, the Appellate Court rejected the school district’s argument that names in the subpoena were exempt
from disclosure under Section 7(1)(a) of FOIA, because the school
district did not demonstrate that any federal law or statute specifically prohibited
disclosing those names.

Third, the Appellate Court determined that names of school district officials and employees in the subpoena “bear on” the duties of public employees, so disclosure would not cause a clearly
unwarranted invasion of personal privacy under Section 7(1)(c) of FOIA.

Next, the Appellate Court held that because the school district is not a law enforcement or correctional
agency, had no investigatory role in the federal grand jury
proceedings, and was not conducting an ongoing criminal investigation, and the school district did not demonstrate that the U.S. Attorney’s Office had a
substantial interest in protecting names in the subpoena, the subpoena was not exempt under the law enforcement exemptions cited by the district.

Finally, because the school
district’s asserted exemptions were not applicable, and the circuit court
previously ordered the school district to release certain information that was
originally redacted in its response to the FOIA request, the Appellate Court determined that the requester was a “prevailing” party in the FOIA
lawsuit and could file a petition requesting the
recovery of attorneys fees and costs as the prevailing party.

Post Authored by Eugene Bolotnikov, Ancel Glink