A United States federal court has rejected a request by Aaron Greenspan to obtain evidence from President Bola Tinubu and DCI Group over alleged cyberattacks on his website, while leaving unresolved a wider dispute over historical investigative records sought from US federal agencies.

Judge Beryl A. Howell of the US District Court for the District of Columbia ruled on October 30 that the proposed discovery was not sufficiently relevant to Greenspan’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit involving the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

“The Court’s decision makes clear that this Freedom of Information Act proceeding cannot be used to pursue discovery unrelated to the legal questions before it,” Christopher W. Carmichael, an attorney commenting on the ruling, said.

Bayo Onanuga, special adviser to the president on information and strategy, announced the decision on Saturday in a post on X, describing it as a rejection of Greenspan’s attempt to obtain evidence from Tinubu and DCI Group.

The court also rejected a request by Karl Von Batten, a non-party to the case, to file an amicus curiae brief, as well as Greenspan’s related request for judicial notice.

However, the ruling was not an outright victory for the US government in the underlying records dispute. The judge denied Greenspan’s motion for summary judgment and granted the FBI’s competing motion only in part, leaving other aspects of the agencies’ justifications for withholding records subject to further proceedings.

The litigation concerns Greenspan’s efforts to obtain historical investigative records from the FBI and DEA relating to a federal investigation of a Chicago-based money-laundering and heroin-trafficking operation in the early 1990s.

His requests named Tinubu and other individuals. The court previously ordered the agencies to search for and produce non-exempt records after rejecting their initial attempts to refuse to confirm or deny whether responsive records existed.

In the latest ruling, the court found that Greenspan’s proposed investigation into alleged denial-of-service attacks on his website was not sufficiently connected to the legal questions in the FOIA case.

The decision did not determine who was responsible for the alleged cyberattacks, nor did it resolve the wider dispute over access to the historical records.

The court also raised concerns about the agencies’ justifications for withholding some documents, including whether they had adequately demonstrated that disclosure would cause foreseeable harm or whether portions of the records could be released without compromising protected information.

The agencies may submit additional declarations to justify continued withholding, leaving the disclosure dispute ongoing.

Oluwole Afolabi, an attorney commenting on the ruling, said the court had also denied Greenspan’s motion for summary judgment and rejected the separate request to introduce an amicus brief.

“While the underlying FOIA issues remain before the Court, these rulings establish important procedural boundaries and clarify which matters are appropriate for consideration in this litigation,” Afolabi said.

The ruling therefore limits Greenspan’s attempt to expand the proceedings through discovery involving Tinubu and DCI Group, but does not conclude the underlying FOIA litigation.