loanDepot.com, LLC v. CrossCountry Mortgage, LLC
- Sata
- 1:22-cv-05971
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In loanDepot.com v. CrossCountry Mortgage, Judge Sata granted loanDepot’s request to keep customer-related documents sealed.
loanDepot.com, LLC, the defendants and their counsel, the non-party customers whose names and mortgage-loan information appeared in the documents, and members of the public seeking access to those filings.
What happened
In loanDepot.com, LLC v. CrossCountry Mortgage, LLC, loanDepot asked to seal or redact portions of a declaration and exhibit describing confidential files and folders allegedly misappropriated by the defendants. The materials included customer names and other identifying information, with all but the first initial redacted.
The court found that the privacy interests of loanDepot’s non-party customers outweighed the public’s right to access the documents at this stage. It ordered the documents at Docket Nos. 34 and 34-1 to remain sealed and limited access to the parties, identified individuals, and defense counsel of record.
Judge Sata granted the application and directed the Clerk of Court to close the motions at Docket No. 33. The order concerned document access only and did not decide the underlying claims.
The detailed version
- loanDepot.com, LLC v. CrossCountry Mortgage, LLC · No. 1:22-cv-05971
- Sata
- Aug. 19, 2022
Background
loanDepot asked the court for permission to seal or redact limited portions of the Declaration of Jim Vaughn and an attached exhibit filed in support of its request for expedited discovery. According to the request, the documents listed confidential files and folders allegedly misappropriated from loanDepot by the defendants. The titles often contained customer names or other personal identifying information. The filed versions redacted all but the first initial of that customer information.
loanDepot argued that the information was confidential under its agreements with individual defendants and that federal law required it to protect nonpublic customer information. It also argued that disclosure would not serve a public interest outweighing the privacy interests of the individual customers.
Court’s analysis
The court applied the principle that judicial documents are presumptively available to the public, but that this right is not absolute. The court balanced public access against competing privacy interests. It found that filing the documents in redacted form was necessary to prevent disclosure of the names of loanDepot’s non-party customers and details about the status of their prospective mortgage loans, which loanDepot kept confidential.
The court also found that the customers’ names and the names of specific files created by loanDepot about them were not material to an issue then presented in the case. At that stage, the privacy interests of the non-parties outweighed the public’s right of access.
Ruling and effect
The application was granted. The documents filed at Docket Nos. 34 and 34-1 were ordered to remain sealed. Access was limited to the parties, individuals identified in the attached appendix, and other counsel of record for the defendants, including the attorneys listed in the order. The Clerk of Court was directed to close the motions at Docket No. 33.
This was an order about sealing court documents. The opinion did not resolve the underlying dispute or the parties’ substantive claims.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.