Fan v. Amazon.com

Background

Lingling Fan, proceeding without a lawyer, brought this action against Amazon.com concerning an alleged purchase of hyaluronic acid injectable filler on Amazon’s website that she says caused her an injury. The court had granted Fan permission to proceed without paying court filing fees in December 2024, but dismissed the action in February 2025 after she failed to submit a signature page for her complaint. Fan later submitted a signed amended complaint and a motion to reopen. In an order dated September 5, 2025, the court treated that motion as a request for relief from the earlier dismissal under Rule 60(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and granted it.

This order addressed two additional motions: Fan’s motion to seal her application to proceed without paying court filing fees and her emergency motion for a temporary restraining order or other preliminary relief.

Motion to Seal

The court explained that court documents used to influence judicial decisions generally carry a strong presumption of public access under both common law and the First Amendment. An application to proceed without paying court fees is a court document, and general concerns about disclosure of financial information usually do not overcome that presumption.

Fan stated that the application contained sensitive personal financial information and that public disclosure would invade her privacy without serving a public interest. The court found that this general privacy concern was insufficient. The motion also did not involve the privacy interests of third parties. In addition, the application had already been publicly available since November 20, 2024, which weighed against sealing it. The court therefore denied the motion to seal.

Motion for Preliminary Injunctive Relief

Fan requested restoration of her Amazon.com account and a refund for an iPhone purchased through Amazon’s website. To obtain preliminary injunctive relief, she had to show a likelihood of irreparable harm and either a likelihood of success on the merits or sufficiently serious legal questions combined with a balance of hardships strongly favoring her.

The court found that Fan’s submissions did not show either a likelihood of success or sufficiently serious questions meeting that standard. It also found that the relief requested in the motion did not relate to the claims asserted in the complaint. The court therefore denied the request for preliminary injunctive relief and stated that it would issue a further explanatory order later.

Disposition

The court denied Fan’s motion to seal and her motion for preliminary injunctive relief, and directed the clerk to terminate both motions. The court also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that an appeal from this order would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to proceed without paying fees for purposes of an appeal.