Aronow v. Freedom of Info. Comm'n

189 Conn.App. 842

209 A.3d 695

Michael ARONOW

v.FREEDOM OF INFORMATION COMMISSION

AC 41297

Appellate Court of Connecticut.

Argued February 6, 2019

Officially released May 14, 2019

Michael Aronow, self-represented, the appellant (plaintiff).

Kathleen K. Ross, commission counsel, with whom, on the brief, was Colleen M. Murphy, Hartford, general counsel, for the appellee (defendant).

Alvord, Sheldon and Bishop, Js.

BISHOP, J.

The self-represented plaintiff, Michael Aronow,¹ appeals from the dismissal by the trial court of his appeal from the final decision of the defendant Freedom of Information Commission (commission). Although, after a hearing, the commission concluded that the University of Connecticut Health Center (health center)² had violated the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), General Statutes § 1-200 et seq., in regard to document requests made by the plaintiff, the plaintiff appealed to the trial court from the orders and subordinate findings made by the commission. On appeal from the judgment of the court dismissing his appeal from the commission, the plaintiff claims that the court erred in (1) concluding that he was not aggrieved by the commission's decision to decline to impose a civil penalty against the health center for the FOIA violation, (2) dismissing his claim that the commission improperly dismissed a previous FOIA complaint filed by the plaintiff regarding an earlier document request made to the health center, (3) concluding that there was substantial evidence in the record to support the commission's finding that the plaintiff had narrowed the scope of his FOIA request, and (4) concluding that the commission did not abuse its discretion by affording the health center nine months to comply with its document production order.

We agree with the court's conclusions regarding the plaintiff's first and second claims, and, accordingly, affirm the judgment as to those claims. We conclude, however, that the trial court erred in concluding that there was substantial evidence to support the commission's finding that the plaintiff had narrowed the scope of his original FOIA request in regard to paragraph eleven of the commission's final decision.³ Accordingly, the judgment is reversed in part, and the case is remanded to the trial court with direction to remand to the commission with direction to order that the health center comply expeditiously with the plaintiff's original request, as narrowed only by paragraph ten of the commission's final decision.

The following facts and procedural history are relevant to our resolution of this appeal. In his brief, the plaintiff alleges that he "is an orthopaedic surgeon who formerly worked for [the health center], against whom he filed a whistleblower retaliation complaint before the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities' Office of Public Hearings on November 14, 2012 (OPH/ WBR No. 2012-208), which [has been] in the damages phase" since he received a favorable decision on liability. Additionally, on March 31, 2012, the plaintiff separated from the health center under disputed circumstances. In his whistleblower complaint against the health center pursuant to General Statutes § 4-61dd, the plaintiff alleged, inter alia, that the health center took retaliatory actions leading to his separation in response to certain actions he had previously taken that caused him to fall out of favor with health center supervisory personnel, such as his filing of a grievance.⁴ These allegations are supported by proceedings from which we take judicial notice.⁵

On August 19, 2013, the plaintiff e-mailed a FOIA request to Scott Wetstone, a medical doctor employed by the health center who acted as its freedom of information (FOI) officer. The request was for production of all e-mails sent or received by Jay R. Lieberman, a medical doctor formerly employed by the health center, from July 1, 2009, to the date of the request; all Microsoft Word and PDF documents created or modified on Dr. Lieberman's health center computer from July 1, 2010, to the date of the request; and a list of all e-mails and documents that fell within this request but were exempt from disclosure, and reasons why they were exempt. On December 13, 2013, Dr. Wetstone e-mailed the plaintiff to notify him that the previous FOIA requests⁶ that the plaintiff had made to the health center were "essentially completed" and that he would begin working on the plaintiff's August 19, 2013 request. Dr. Wetstone also suggested in this e-mail that, in light of the number and the nature of the documents he had requested and the fact that the plaintiff had already submitted an extensive discovery request to the health center in a separate matter, the plaintiff should narrow the scope of his request. The plaintiff subsequently agreed to exclude a number of categories of records from the scope of his request.

On March 17, 2014, the plaintiff filed a complaint with the commission; see Aronow v. University of Connecticut Health Center , Freedom of Information Commission, Docket No. FIC 2014-156 (February 4, 2015) (FIC 2014-156); alleging that he had not received the documents requested, and that there had been no activity regarding his request since December, 2013. On June 30, 2014, while that matter was pending, the plaintiff sent an e-mail to Dr. Wetstone requesting that he expedite the release of certain requested documents that were relevant to the plaintiff's pending Health Center Appeals Committee (committee) appeal.⁷ In July, 2014, the plaintiff and Dr. Wetstone exchanged further e-mails regarding the use of a Dropbox⁸ account to provide the plaintiff with the documents that he had requested for his committee appeal. After having issues with obtaining the documents from the designated Dropbox folder, the plaintiff acknowledged the receipt of seventeen of the 139 requested documents that Dr. Wetstone had informed the plaintiff he was sending.

On December 16, 2014, over one year after acknowledging that he would begin working on the plaintiff's August 19, 2013 request, and several months after the plaintiff had filed his complaint in FIC 2014-156, Dr. Wetstone e-mailed the plaintiff the following message: "Per our discussion this morning, you have my personal commitment to get ... the documents [at issue in FIC 2014-156] no later than the end of March 2015.... Later today, I will attempt to find the files that I initially put in the drop box last summer. I can't find them immediately and need to tend to other things right now."

On February 4, 2015, the commission adopted a final decision dismissing the plaintiff's FIC 2014-156 complaint for lack of jurisdiction on the ground that the complaint had not been timely filed pursuant to General Statutes § 1-206 (b) (1).⁹ On that same day, the plaintiff resubmitted to Dr. Wetstone the FOIA request that he had originally requested on August 19, 2013. On February 17, 2015, the plaintiff again filed a complaint with the commission; see Aronow v. University of Connecticut Health Center , Freedom of Information Commission, Docket No. FIC 2015-127 (October 28, 2015) (FIC 2015-127); alleging that the health center had violated the FOIA by failing to promptly provide him with all of the documents he had requested.

Subsequently, on March 17, 2015, the plaintiff filed an appeal from the commission's decision in FIC 2014-156 to the Superior Court. On June 18, 2015, the court dismissed that appeal as moot on the ground that the plaintiff's hearing in FIC 2015-127, in which he sought the same records, was pending before the commission. A hearing on FIC 2015-127 was held before a hearing officer on July 1, 2015. During the hearing, Dr. Wetstone testified regarding the factors that were crucial for determining how long it would take to comply with the plaintiff's particular FOIA request. Dr. Wetstone indicated that, at the time of the hearing, the health center had ten active requests from the plaintiff, nine of which would take a few months to resolve. He indicated, as well, that the plaintiff's February 4, 2015 request was "by far the largest" request he had encountered in his fifteen year history of handling FOIA requests. Additionally, Dr. Wetstone claimed that there was a possibility that multiple FOIA exemptions would apply to the requested documents and that each document needed to be reviewed to determine whether any of those exemptions applied. Dr. Wetstone also asserted that in addition to acting as the FOI officer for the health center, he had multiple other responsibilities that affected how long compliance with the plaintiff's request would take. Finally, Dr. Wetstone testified that many of the individuals employed by the health center who would be required to search for certain requested documents were also responsible for providing direct patient care or for educating medical students.

On October 1, 2015, the hearing officer issued a proposed final decision. On October 8, 2015, the health center provided the plaintiff with some of the documents he had requested together with a privilege log claiming exemptions as to certain other documents.

On October 28, 2015, the commission adopted the proposed final decision of the hearing officer. The commission found that the health center had violated General Statutes §§ 1-210 (a)¹⁰ and 1-212 (a)¹¹ by failing to comply promptly with the plaintiff's records requests. In addition, the commission found that the plaintiff's February 4, 2015 request was identical to the August 19, 2013 request that had been at issue in FIC 2014-156, and took administrative notice of certain findings of fact in FIC 2014-156 that were relevant to the determination of whether the health center had violated the promptness requirement of the FOIA. In taking notice of FIC 2014-156, the commission determined that the plaintiff had agreed to exclude broadcast e-mails, journal articles, and research data from his records request (paragraph ten). The commission found,...