Case: 22-10848 Document: 00516815456 Page: 1 Date Filed: 07/10/2023 United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit ____________ FILED July 10, 2023 No. 22-10848 Lyle W. Cayce ____________ Clerk Harold Edward Rutila, IV, Plaintiff—Appellant, versus United States Department of Transportation; Federal Aviation Administration, Defendants—Appellees. ______________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas USDC Nos. 3:16-CV-2911, 3:16-CV-3433 ______________________________ Before King, Smith, and Elrod, Circuit Judges. Per Curiam: This action arises from several unsuccessful requests by Harold Edward Rutila, IV to the Federal Aviation Administration for records under the Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. § 522. The district court granted summary judgment for the Department of Transportation and the Federal Aviation Administration. Upon review, we AFFIRM. Case: 22-10848 Document: 00516815456 Page: 2 Date Filed: 07/10/2023 No. 22-10848 I. In 2016, Harold Edward Rutila, IV attended a Federal Aviation Administration (“FAA”) air traffic controller training program at the FAA Academy. Because he failed the final performance assessment, Rutila was not retained as a permanent air traffic controller. Several months later, Rutila submitted ten requests under the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) to the FAA seeking various categories of records. Dissatisfied with the FAA’s responses to his requests, Rutila brought two suits against the FAA and its parent agency, the Department of Transportation (“DOT”; collectively with the FAA, “Appellees”), seeking, inter alia, injunctive relief compelling the release and disclosure of the requested agency records. The district court later consolidated the two lawsuits. Appellees moved to dismiss most of Rutila’s claims, and the district court dismissed seven of Rutila’s requests in May 2019 for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Appellees then moved for summary judgment on the three remaining requests, which the district court granted in May 2020. Rutila appealed and argued that the district court erred in concluding that it did not have subject matter jurisdiction with respect to five of his requests. We agreed and reversed, holding that Rutila alleged facts sufficient to invoke the court’s subject matter jurisdiction, and remanded the case back to the district court. Rutila v. U.S. Dep’t of Transp., 12 F.4th 509, 511 (5th Cir. 2021). On remand, Appellees moved for summary judgment a second time on the five revived requests, which the district court granted in June 2022. Rutila now appeals the district court’s judgment with respect to three of his requests: (1) FOIA Request 2016-009149 (“FOIA 9149”), which seeks FAA Academy Standard Operating Procedures (“SOPs”) and related emails; and (2) FOIA Request 2017-000862 (“FOIA 862”) and (3) FOIA 2 Case: 22-10848 Document: 00516815456 Page: 3 Date Filed: 07/10/2023 No. 22-10848 Request 2017-001174 (“FOIA 1174”), which respectively seek copies of specific individuals’ application software profiles and Windows Explorer directories and folder structures. II. FOIA “requires federal agencies to make Government records available to the public,” Milner v. Dep’t of the Navy, 562 U.S. 562, 564 (2011), and “empowers federal courts to order an ‘agency’ to produce ‘agency records improperly withheld’ from an …
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