SEC investigation into Alcoa Inc.

To Whom It May Concern:

This is a request under the Freedom of Information Act. I hereby request the following records:

Emails, letters, faxes and all other written or electronic communications produced by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission concerning Alcoa's (Alcoa of Australia and Alcoa World Alumina LLC collectively, the AWAC Subsidiaries) violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act while conducting commercial business with Aluminium Bahrain, aka Alba, between 1989 and 2009. Because the volume of material may be quite large I request that you limit the search to documents which detail how and when payments (bribes) from Alcoa were transferred to the Kingdom of Bahrain's government officials and the names of those government officials.

I also request that, if appropriate, fees be waived as I believe this request is in the public interest. The requested documents will be made available to the general public free of charge as part of the public information service at MuckRock.com, processed by a representative of the news media/press and is made in the process of news gathering and not for commercial usage.

In the event that fees cannot be waived, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 20 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Troy Carter

To Whom It May Concern:

I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on Jan. 22, 2014. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed. You had assigned it reference number #14-03662-FOIA .

Thank you for your help.

To Whom It May Concern:

I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on Jan. 22, 2014. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed. You had assigned it reference number #14-03662-FOIA .

Thank you for your help.

Securities and Exchange Commission
Station Place, 100 F Street NE, Mail Stop 2736
Washington, D.C. 20549

March 31, 2014

To: General Counsel, Securities and Exchange Commission

Re: Freedom of Information Act Appeal

This is an appeal of the decision to withhold SEC records that may be responsive to Freedom of Information Act request No. 14-03662-FOIA which requested Emails, letters, faxes and all other written or electronic communications produced by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission concerning Alcoa's (Alcoa of Australia and Alcoa World Alumina LLC collectively, the AWAC Subsidiaries) violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act while conducting commercial business with Aluminium Bahrain, aka Alba, between 1989 and 2009. Because the volume of material may be quite large I request that you limit the search to documents which detail how and when payments (bribes) from Alcoa were transferred to the Kingdom of Bahrain's government officials and the names of those government officials.

I appeal because the SEC's letter of denial, citing FOIA Exemption 7(a), fails to demonstrate that a) the information requested affects a specific law enforcement proceeding which is pending, prospective, or reasonably anticipated, and b) whether release of the information requested could reasonably be expected to cause distinct harm to law enforcement proceedings. This two part test has been firmly established by U.S. District and Appeals Courts as necessary when invoking exemption 7(a) (See Dept. of Justice FOIA Exemption 7(a) guide http://www.justice.gov/oip/foia_guide09/exemption7a.pdf ).

As has been reported by the Department of Justice, the requested files are part of an investigation which has been closed ( See: http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2014/January/14-crm-019.html ). This suggests the failure of exemption 7(A)'s first test. Furthermore, the records that I have requested, which detail the ways in which bribes were made, and the names of those who were bribed, are unlikely to affect law enforcement proceedings because a) the names of those officials have already been partially reported and b) US law would likely give any officials identified in the requested records immunity from US criminal proceedings. This means the second exemption test also fails as the records would have no distinct legal harm on proceedings.

For these reasons I appeal the adverse determination of my request.

Thank you,
Troy Carter