In 2022, a requester sued a
county board, a county sheriff, and a county’s state’s attorney’s office
(defendants) for several alleged FOIA violations. During the litigation,
defendants requested the circuit court to: (1) allow defendants to designate
one of the requester’s FOIA requests as unduly burdensome because defendants identified over 69,000 pages of responsive records to the request, or (2) in
the alternative, to perform an in camera review of defendants responsive records to assess whether FOIA exemptions applied to the records.
The circuit court appointed a special master to review defendants’ 69,000 pages
of records to determine which parts of the records qualified for exemptions,
and ordered the requester to pay the special master’s retainer prior to the
start of their services. The requester did not make the court-ordered retainer
payment, which led the circuit court to rule in favor of defendants, finding
that the requester’s FOIA request was unduly burdensome, and that the requester
failed to comply with the court’s prior order requiring pre-payment of the
special master’s fees for review services.

After the requester appealed
the circuit court’s ruling, an Illinois Appellate Court: (1) held that the circuit court erred when it appointed a special master and required the requester to pay the special master’s review services fees, and (2)
ordered the circuit court to re-instate the requester’s FOIA lawsuit and conduct
that proceeding in accordance with FOIA. Dorman
v. Madison County.

The Appellate Court reasoned
that FOIA places the burden of justifying nondisclosure squarely on public
bodies, and that FOIA contemplates that the court itself will resolve
disputes concerning exemptions and disclosure. The Appellate Court determined
that the circuit court’s inherent authority to control their proceedings may
not be exercised in a way that conflicts with, or expands beyond, a legislatively
prescribed statutory scheme. Here, the Appellate Court determined that
the FOIA statute does not permit courts to (i) delegate their express statutory in
camera review responsibilities to third parties, (ii) impose
compliance or review-related costs on a requester, or (iii) condition the
continuation of a requester’s FOIA action on their payment for special master
services.

Post Authored by Eugene Boltnikov, Ancel Glink