ELR Citation: ELR 20745
No(s). 73-1258 (7th Cir. Jul 27, 1973)

The Freedom of Information Act does not protect from discovery sections of internal deliberative memoranda of the Atomic Energy Commission's Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS) that contain purely factual material and are severable from their non-discoverable context. An affidavit from the Secretary of ACRS is not sufficient per se to gain exemption under the Act for material excised from minutes of committee meetings concerning three nuclear power plants near Lake Michigan; and it is within the district court's discretion to order in camera inspection of the excised material. The district court's grant of summary judgment for plaintiffs seeking discovery is affirmed in part and reversed in part since one of the documents ordered produced was deliberative. The case is remanded in order that the district court may determine what portions of the 9,000 pages of ACRS minutes regarding other nuclear power plants should also be disclosed.

Counsel for Plaintiffs
Myron M. Cherry
Alexander Polikoff
Robert J. Vallen
Suite 105
109 N. Dearborn Street
Chicago, IL 60602

Counsel for Defendants
Walter Fleischer
Department of Justice
Washington, DC 20530

Martin R. Hoffman General Counsel
U.S. Atomic Energy Commission
Washington, DC 20545