FBI Kept Demanding Email Records Despite DOJ Saying It Needed a Warrant
This stuff is becoming more and more maddening to hear after my recent FOIA adventures.I requested this from Chicago's Mayor's office last week:Please provide to me all communications or records of communication (phone, email, receipts of phone/email, etc) from those in the mayor's office for the below companies. Please limit the search to Oct, Nov, Dec of 2014.Aura - Prestige Club (of verycoolrooms.com)Kennealy & O CallaghanStatewide Investigative ServicesAzura InvestigationsTheir response, which reeks of complete bullshit:In order to run an email search, the Mayor’s Office needs the names or email accounts that you wish searched. The email system’s tool set cannot identify the department where an email user works, and therefore, a search cannot be based on a department. Parameters that would assist the Mayor’s Office in conducting an email search include: (1) the e-mail address of the account you wish searched; and (2) the e-mail address of each individual’s mailbox, if you seek e-mail correspondence to and from two individuals.Without email addresses, search terms, or a time frame, the Mayor’s Office would have to retrieve each and every email for every employee from October – December, 2014, which is both unduly burdensome and costly. After retrieving these e-mails, each and every e-mail message a Mayor’s Office employee received or sent would have to be downloaded and reviewed to determine if it is responsive to your request or is exempt from disclosure. If any exemptions were to apply, the Mayor’s Office would need to redact such information. The entire process of retrieval of the emails, finding responsive records, reviewing for exempt information, and then redacting the materials would be onerous.