Pickard

ORDER GRANTING MOTION FOR DE NOVO REVIEW AND HOLDING THAT GOVERNMENT MAY WITHHOLD MATERIALS

This is a long-standing FOIA case involving a convicted LSD manufacturer’s search for information about a confidential informant who testified against him. The particular motion that is pending, however—Defendant United States Department of Justice’s Second Motion for De Novo Determination of Dispositive Matter Referred to Magistrate Judge, 2d Mot. for De Novo Review (dkt. 260)—involves information that the parties agree is already known, because a confidential informant has already disclosed it. The motion challenges an order by Magistrate Judge Na-thanael M. Cousins holding that none of the government’s claimed FOIA exemptions apply, and ordering released the three categories of materials that Plaintiff William L. Pickard currently seeks: (1) confidential informant Gordon Skinner’s name, (2) information Skinner has voluntarily disclosed to the public, and (3) Skinner’s NADDIS number. 1 See generally Order to Release (dkt. 243).

*1083 That Pickard only currently seeks the three categories that he does makes the Court’s task unusual. Ordinarily, it is clear to the Court that its rulings…