Rauch Industries, Inc. v. Heart Artist LLC and Christopher Radko

Background

Rauch Industries, Inc. petitioned to confirm and enforce an arbitration award against Heart Artist LLC and Christopher Radko. According to the petition, the award arose from alleged breaches of a Confidential Settlement Agreement that resolved an earlier trademark-infringement lawsuit. Rauch alleged 36 breaches, and the arbitrator, the Honorable Barbara S. Jones, issued an award in Rauch’s favor on July 23, 2025. The petition stated that $1,297,492 was due under the award.

The respondents had not yet been served or appeared. Rauch nevertheless filed a letter motion seeking to seal materials supporting its petition. It sought to fully seal Exhibit C to the declaration of Kathryn K. Saba, which was the Confidential Settlement Agreement. It also sought temporary sealing of its memorandum of law and Exhibits A, B, D, and F to the Saba Declaration. Those exhibits included the arbitration award, related emails and invoices, the parties’ stipulated facts, and an arbitrator’s email granting in part a request for more time.

Legal standard

The court explained that judicial documents generally carry a presumption of public access. A court must determine whether a document is a judicial document, assess the strength of the public-access presumption, and then weigh competing interests that may justify restricting access. The party seeking sealing bears the burden of showing that a higher value, such as protection of sensitive commercial information, outweighs public access. Any sealing must be narrowly tailored.

Settlement Agreement

The court treated the Confidential Settlement Agreement as a judicial document because Rauch submitted it in support of its petition and the court might need to consider it when deciding whether to confirm the arbitration award. The court found that the Agreement appeared to contain provisions reflecting confidential marketing plans and strategies, and that disclosure might cause competitive harm.

However, the court found that Rauch’s request was not sufficiently specific to justify sealing the entire 40-page Agreement for the remainder of the litigation. Rauch had not identified the particular provisions containing confidential information or explained why disclosure of the entire Agreement would cause competitive harm. The court therefore declined to rule at that time on whether the Agreement should remain sealed throughout the case. It granted Rauch’s request only to the extent that the Agreement could remain temporarily sealed for the time being.

Other materials

The court also treated Rauch’s memorandum of law and Exhibits A, B, D, and F as judicial documents. It noted that the confidentiality of arbitration proceedings does not automatically overcome the presumption of public access. But because the respondents had not yet appeared, the court concluded that it would be inappropriate to require unsealing before hearing whether they believed any of the materials, or portions of them, should remain confidential.

The court therefore granted Rauch’s motion for temporary sealing of the memorandum and Exhibits A, B, D, and F. It expected the respondents, after being served and appearing, to promptly state whether they sought continued sealing and to identify the specific information requiring protection and any proposed narrow redactions.

Disposition

The court granted Rauch’s motion to seal. The Agreement was granted temporary sealing only, with no decision on permanent or continued sealing of the entire document. Temporary sealing of the memorandum and Exhibits A, B, D, and F was also granted.