Supreme Court takes case on pilot's privacy

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court took up an important privacy case Wednesday that traces to the mid-2000s when the Social Security Administration and Department of Transportation exchanged confidential information related to thousands of private pilots.

As part of the fraud investigation called "Operation Safe Pilot," Social Security officials revealed to aviation regulators that San Francisco pilot Stanmore Cooper was HIV-positive and had obtained disability benefits.

Cooper, who had not admitted his condition as he repeatedly renewed his pilot's license and medical certificate, said he was "devastated" by the breach of medical privacy. In the core dispute before the justices Wednesday, Cooper sued under a 1974 privacy law intended to prevent federal agencies from sharing or publicly leaking information.

He sought money damages for the anxiety, sleeplessness, loss of appetite and other physical ailments he developed when his medical information was shared among agencies without his consent. The government said his claim should be dismissed because the privacy law permits money only for financial losses, which Cooper did not assert, and not for emotional injuries.

A federal trial judge agreed, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit reversed and said the post-Watergate privacy statute's reference to "actual damages" covers proven mental or emotional distress arising from the intentional release of private information.

The high court on Wednesday heard the government's appeal in the case that could affect the ability of victims of government privacy breaches to obtain damages for mental and emotional distress. Lower courts are split on whether "actual damages" encompass such distress along with out-of-pocket financial losses.

Among the groups that have entered the case on the side of Cooper are the National Whistleblower Center and the AIDS Foundation of Chicago. The latter organization, joined by other advocates for people with the virus, referred to "the intense fear that many people living with HIV have of unauthorized disclosure of their HIV status, because such disclosures often lead to intense stigma, discrimination and psychological injuries."

Cooper's situation is unusual because he deliberately declined to reveal he was HIV-positive on FAA forms — even after it no longer would have been disqualifying. Cooper, who started flying in 1964, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge and was sentenced to two years of probation and fined $1,000. Yet his case could affect people in a multitude of situations, including those who might be subject to government leaks as retaliation.

Raymond Cardozo, Cooper's lawyer, told the justices the case could particularly impact "the whistle-blower who the government chooses to silence by embarrassing and humiliating them."

Cardozo argued that the government's narrow interpretation of the law's remedies "would mean that the very individuals Congress sought to protect in this act would have no remedy at all for the primary form of harm" that occurs when private information is released.

Assistant U.S. Solicitor General Eric Feigin countered that, based on the context and history of the legislation, the phrase "actual damages" covers only out-of-pocket expenses. "If Congress had intended to … allow uncapped emotional distress claims," it would have stated it clearly, he told the justices.