Accettola v. He
- Lewis Liman
- 1:23-cv-01983
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 1
In Accettola v. He, Judge Liman denied the plaintiff’s request to strike a sealed letter from the docket and planned to unseal it.
The ruling affected Hong Danielle Accettola’s request concerning her sealed letter at Dkt. No. 43 and the letter’s status on the court docket.
What happened
In Accettola v. He, the plaintiff asked to withdraw and remove from the docket a sealed letter she had previously filed. The letter was docketed as Dkt. No. 43.
The court denied the request to strike. It said requests to strike are generally disfavored, and the plaintiff had not shown a strong reason for removing the letter. The court also noted that she had not provided the order she believed might restrict the letter’s disclosure and admitted she did not know that order’s contents.
Judge Lewis J. Liman said the court planned to direct the clerk to unseal the letter on June 26, 2024.
The detailed version
- Accettola v. He · No. 1:23-cv-01983
- Lewis Liman
- June 25, 2024
Background
Hong Danielle Accettola asked the court, in a June 24, 2024 letter, to withdraw and strike from the docket her earlier sealed ex parte letter, filed as Dkt. No. 43 on June 18, 2024.
Court’s analysis
The court stated that the only authority for a motion to strike of which it was aware was Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(f). That rule allows a court to remove from a pleading an insufficient defense or matter that is redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous. The court explained that such motions are generally disfavored and granted only when there is a strong reason to do so.
Accettola referred to an order that she suggested might be implicated by the letter’s contents, but she did not provide the court with a copy of that order. She also admitted that she did not know the order’s contents. The court noted that no other person or party had stated that disclosing the letter would violate the order. The court concluded that Accettola had not identified a strong reason to strike the letter.
Ruling
Judge Lewis J. Liman denied Accettola’s request to strike the letter. The court stated that it planned to direct the clerk to unseal the letter at Dkt. No. 43 on June 26, 2024.
Read the full 1-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.