Remember how Otto Reich sued the kids behind Derwick Associates for a bunch of stuff including racketeering? And then how the kids, popularly known as the Bolichicos, said hey, the court doesn’t have jurisdiction, and I’ll prove it by showing my personal data, but I want all that to be confidential? No? Well, anyway, that’s one of the main things that has happened so far in that case.
Well Otto Reich (no longer confused with Otto Rock) has now gone back and requested that the court make all the confidential Derwick details public. In the public interest, and because the Bolichicos supposedly never properly pleaded their case.
There is a very strong presumption in the Second Circuit – based on the First Amendment – that judicial documents (including submissions in connection with dispositive motions) must be available to the public and may not be sealed absent compelling circumstances. The Second Circuit has ruled repeatedly that a paiiy seeking a sealing order must meet an extremely high burden to justify its request, and that the Court may not grant such a request, or order documents to be filed under seal, without making specific findings on the record overcoming that Constitutionally-based presumption. None of the factors or procedures necessary to permit the sealing of documents relating to the Motions has been satisfied here. Accordingly, the Court’s Interim Sealing Order requiring the filing of documents under seal should be vacated, and the parties’ submissions in connection with the Motions, including the parties’ discovery letters, should be unsealed and made available to the public like in every other case in the Southern District of New York…
There is no reason – much less a compelling one – that could justify the Court’s sealing of the parties’ submissions relating to Defendants’ Motions. There are no “higher values” that could conceivably justify preventing public access to this information.
I’m running low on popcorn.
Setty's notebook 