An Update on Miller v MDHHS
My Reply to the Defendant's Affirmative Defenses and First Amended Complaint.
If you’re an attorney that’s experienced with the Michigan Freedom of Information Act and are licensed to practice in the State of Michigan, contact me if you’re interested in helping me with this case. (However, I’m not giving up even if I have to represent myself the whole way through — this case is too important, and I’ve put too much work into this investigation.)
About two weeks ago, I wrote about the public records lawsuit I recently filed against the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services seeking public records related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In a nutshell, I’m seeking the Court’s in-camera review (and hopefully release) of a particular set of government records that were partially withheld from me under a FOIA request I filed last year, along with other FOIA-specific penalties. The documents I’m seeking are related to the health department’s work with a controversial global consulting firm and government contractor called McKinsey & Company during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
Because McKinsey was involved in government pandemic responses across the globe in 2020 and 2021, my goal is to understand, as completely as possible, the role McKinsey played in Michigan’s pandemic response.
In particular, I’m interested the firm’s role in the construction and closure of a short-lived, multi-million-dollar field hospital in downtown Detroit called the TCF Regional Care Center, as well as the counting of COVID-19 cases in the state’s nursing homes and long-term care facilities, including patients that were transferred between facilities — something that has been a topic of public interest over the last several years both in Michigan and in other places, like New York, where McKinsey reportedly worked on a report related to the subject of nursing home deaths, according to the New York Times.1
Unfortunately, I was unable to find an attorney to represent me in my public records lawsuit before the deadline to file ran out. Because the clock was ticking on my FOIA request’s statute of limitations, I initiated the legal action pro se — meaning I’m representing myself. My only other choice would have been to let it all go and walk away from two years of intensely hard work and research, which wasn’t an option for me.
After another disappointing false start last week (an acquaintance of mine, who is a far more talented and far more experienced reporter than me, believed he’d found an attorney to represent me — only to have that attorney change their mind a few days later, claiming again to be “too busy”), I was forced, again, to teach myself about the law and draft and file a reply to MDHHS’s affirmative defenses (I’m not an attorney, but from what I understand, it’s good practice to respond to those pesky things — and on time, at that).
I also filed an amended complaint, correcting a clerical error regarding the dates of a McKinsey contract, citing a law, and attaching a copy of an unpublished court opinion that I should have attached to the original complaint to begin with. (No substantive changes were made, so if you’ve already read the original complaint, be warned that the amended one is almost identical.)
Still, in the spirit of transparency, I wanted to share those documents with you.
THE COURT DOCUMENTS
First Amended Complaint (or view here):
Plaintiff’s Reply to Defendant’s Affirmative Defenses (or view here):
As usual, I’ve redacted my personal contact information and the email and phone number of the health department’s attorneys, for obvious reasons.
WHAT’S NEXT FOR MILLER V. MDHHS
Again, I’m not a lawyer, so I have no idea if I prepared the documents correctly, but I did the best I could while simultaneously reporting on a lengthy feature for a local news magazine and working a second job (because rent, ugh). Hopefully I didn’t mess them up too badly.
In any case, the ball is in the government’s court now. I’ll keep everyone posted about whatever happens next.
— em
Goodman, J. David and Danny Hakim. “Cuomo Aides Rewrote Nursing Home Report to Hide Higher Death Toll.” The New York Times, March 4, 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/04/nyregion/cuomo-nursing-home-deaths.html (retrieved April 17, 2023).
4/18/2023 - Updated article to reflect the department’s partial denial of the records sought under my FOIA request and added an additional detail about citing a law in my amended complaint.