Farsura v. QC Terme US Corp

Background

Defendants asked the court to seal Exhibit A to their response concerning plaintiffs’ challenges to defendants’ claims that certain communications were protected from disclosure. They also asked the court to redact the portion of their response that quoted from Exhibit A. Plaintiffs opposed that request. The parties agreed that Exhibit B and the portion of the response quoting Exhibit B should be unsealed and unredacted.

Exhibit A was a translation of minutes from an October 2017 meeting of the QC Terme executive committee. According to the filing, the document had been produced during discovery and designated confidential under the case’s protective order. Defendants said it contained financial projections, future business strategies, corporate decisions, and third-party contracts.

Arguments and legal standard

Defendants argued that Exhibit A was not a “judicial document,” meaning a document sufficiently connected to the court’s decision-making to receive a presumption of public access. They maintained that the exhibit was submitted only in connection with a discovery-related dispute about privilege and did not concern the merits of the parties’ claims or defenses.

Defendants also argued that sealing would be appropriate even if a public-access right applied because the exhibit contained confidential business information. The filing cited standards requiring courts to weigh the public’s access interests against interests such as protecting commercially sensitive information.

Ruling

The court stated that it had reviewed the material and that “the request to seal is granted.” The order therefore granted defendants’ request to seal Exhibit A and to redact the portion of the filing quoting from it. The opinion text does not provide a separate explanation of the court’s reasoning beyond that ruling.