Media Glow Digital, LLC v. Panasonic Corporation of North America
- Paul Gardephe
- 1:16-cv-07907
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Media Glow v. Panasonic, Judge Gardephe ordered Panasonic to file a motion to seal its pretrial filings with document-specific explanations.
Panasonic, which was ordered to justify sealing its supplemental pretrial brief and related exhibits.
What happened
Media Glow Digital and Times Square LED are plaintiffs in a case against Panasonic and other defendants. Panasonic filed a supplemental pretrial brief and related exhibits under seal without first filing a sealing motion.
The court noted that at least some submitted documents, including the December 5, 2011 Millennium Agreement, had already been publicly filed. It ordered Panasonic to file a sealing motion by March 31, 2021, following the court’s rules.
Judge Gardephe also required Panasonic to explain, exhibit by exhibit, why sealing was appropriate under the cited legal standard and to propose any specific redactions according to the court’s rules.
The detailed version
- Media Glow Digital, LLC v. Panasonic Corporation of North America · No. 1:16-cv-07907
- Paul Gardephe
- Mar. 24, 2021
Background
On March 19, 2021, Panasonic filed its supplemental pretrial brief and exhibits to a supporting declaration under seal. Panasonic had not first filed a motion asking the court to seal those materials. The court also noted that at least some of the materials, including the December 5, 2011 Millennium Agreement, were already publicly filed.
Court’s Order
The court directed Panasonic to file a motion to seal by March 31, 2021, in accordance with the court’s Individual Rules of Practice. The motion must explain, separately for each exhibit, why sealing is justified under the standard discussed in Lugosch v. Pyramid Co. of Onondaga. The court stated that Panasonic could propose specific redactions if it did so under the court’s rules. This order required Panasonic to submit the sealing motion; it did not itself decide whether the materials should ultimately remain sealed.
Disposition
Judge Gardephe ordered Panasonic to file the required motion and exhibit-by-exhibit justifications by the stated deadline.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.