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外文期刊>Journal of Air Law and Commerce
>UNFAIR DISCLOSURE-ADOPTING A LIMITED CONSULTANT COROLLARY FOR FOIA'S EXEMPTION 5 IN ATTORNEY WORK-PRODUCT CASES PRESERVES LITIGATION PARITY FOR AGENCIES LIKE THE FAA
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UNFAIR DISCLOSURE-ADOPTING A LIMITED CONSULTANT COROLLARY FOR FOIA'S EXEMPTION 5 IN ATTORNEY WORK-PRODUCT CASES PRESERVES LITIGATION PARITY FOR AGENCIES LIKE THE FAA
THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA)'s Exemption 5 allows government agencies to withhold requested "inter-agency or intra-agency" documents if a party in litigation with the agency would not be entitled to those documents. The "consultant corollary," a widely used interpretation of Exemption 5, defines documents produced for a government agency by the agency's outside contractor as "intra-agency" documents, widening the exemption's scope. In Rojas v. Federal Aviation Administration, the Ninth Circuit rejected the consultant corollary, holding that only documents actually produced by an agency employee are within the text of Exemption 5. While the Ninth Circuit's Rojas approach respects FOIA's pro-disclosure purpose and strictly hews to the statute's text, as applied to attorney work-product privilege, it creates a "lopsided loophole" that allows a party in litigation with an agency to unfairly gain privileged information.4 To avoid this result, courts should instead employ a limited consultant corollary, implicitly approved by the Supreme Court in Department of the Interior v. Klamath Water Users Protective Association,5 extending "intra-agency" status to memoranda produced by an agency's neutral, hired consultant in preparation for litigation. This Klamath-limited approach to the consultant corollary is "textually possible," the Court has indicated, and is necessary to give Exemption 5 its intended effect.
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机译：信息法案（FOIA）豁免5允许政府机构扣留所要求的“机构间或内部或内部”文件，如果诉讼中的诉讼缔约方无权享有这些文件。 “顾问推论”，广泛使用对豁免5的解释，定义了该机构外部承包商作为“机构内部”文件为政府机构制作的文件，扩大了豁免的范围。在Rojas v。联邦航空管理局，第九巡回巡回巡回赛拒绝了顾问推论，只有机构员工实际生产的文件只在豁免文本中。虽然第九巡回巡回赛的Rojas方法尊重FOIA的亲披露目的，并严格披露FOIA的专业披露目的，并严格地遵守根据律师工作产品特权的法规的文本，它创造了一个“不平衡漏洞”，允许诉讼中的一方与机构不公平地获得特权信息.4避免这一结果，法院应该雇用有限的顾问推论，内政部上方法院综合批准。Klamath Water Vills保护协会，5延长了“机构内部”地位，以代理机构中立的备忘录制备的备忘录为诉讼制定诉讼。这种驻顾问的方法有限的顾问推论是“娇小的可能”，法院已表示，这是必要的，以豁免5个预期效果。
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