United States Second Circuit

In a First Amendment action claiming that the CIA was required to allow former employee Valerie Plame Wilson to publish a memoir about her tenure at the agency, summary judgment for defendants is affirmed where: 1) plaintiff, and not the agency, permitted the classified information at issue to be revealed to the public; and 2) further, the public disclosure did not deprive the information of classified status, and the agency demonstrated good reason for adhering to its classification decision. A former CIA agent cannot use her own unauthorized disclosure of classified information to challenge the CIA's ability to maintain the information as classified.

Appellate Information

• Decided 11/12/2009
• Published 11/12/2009

Judges

• Before:  KATZMANN and RAGGI, Circuit Judges, and KEENAN, District Judge.

Court

• United States Second Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• David B. Smallman, Smallman & Hans LLP, New York, NY, for Plaintiffs-Appellants., R. Bruce Rich and Jonathan Bloom, Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, New York, New York, for Amici Curiae Association of American Publishers, Inc., American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, American Society of Newspaper Editors, Association of Alternative Newsweeklies, Association of American University Presses, Freedom to Read Foundation, Magazine Publishers Association, Public Citizen, Inc., Publishers Marketing Association, Radio-Television News Directors Association, Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, and Society of Professional Journalists, in support of Plaintiffs-Appellants.


• For Appellees:
  
• Benjamin H. Torrance, Assistant United States Attorney (Beth E. Goldman, Assistant United States Attorney, on the brief), for Michael J. Garcia, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, New York, New York, for Defendants-Appellees.