Noly De Kafati v. Jesus Kafati Kafati
- Vernon Broderick
- 1:22-cv-09906
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 6
In Noly De Kafati v. Jesús Kafati Kafati, Judge Broderick ordered limited redactions and set a telephone hearing on the requested injunction.
The order affects Petitioners and Respondents by determining what information in the injunction filings will remain public, while protecting specified personal, business, settlement, and third-party privacy information. It also sets the hearing date for Petitioners’ motion.
What happened
Noly De Kafati v. Jesús Kafati Kafati concerns Petitioners’ request for an order stopping a related lawsuit while arbitration continues. The court considered whether Petitioners could keep parts of their filings and exhibits from public view.
The court held that materials supporting the requested preliminary injunction are judicial documents with a strong presumption of public access. It allowed redaction of settlement amounts and payment schedules, personal information, confidential business information about privately held companies, and certain detailed information involving third-party privacy interests. It rejected broader proposed redactions covering general descriptions of the dispute.
Judge Vernon S. Broderick ordered Petitioners to file the Petition, legal memorandum, and exhibits with the permitted redactions by December 16, 2022. He also ordered that the hearing on the motion take place by telephone on January 6, 2023.
The detailed version
- Noly De Kafati v. Jesus Kafati Kafati · No. 1:22-cv-09906
- Vernon Broderick
- Dec. 9, 2022
Background
Petitioners sought an anti-suit injunction—an order restricting related litigation—in support of ongoing arbitration proceedings with Respondents. The court had previously directed Petitioners to propose redactions to their Petition, memorandum of law, and supporting exhibits, which had been filed under seal in an earlier related proceeding. Petitioners proposed redacting information about settlement agreements, the dispute that led to those agreements, privately held companies affected by them, and personal information such as email addresses and tax information.
Access to the Filed Materials
The court explained that filed materials relevant to the court’s work are generally presumed to be open to the public. Materials submitted to support a request for a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction receive the highest level of that presumption. A confidentiality agreement alone does not overcome the public’s right of access. Any sealing or redaction must be narrowly tailored to protect a stronger interest, and the court must make specific findings supporting it.
The court found that the Petition, memorandum, and exhibits were materials filed in support of a preliminary-injunction motion. It rejected proposed redactions covering general descriptions of the dispute because Petitioners had not shown a sufficient reason to keep that information private. However, it allowed redaction of monetary amounts and payment schedules connected to the settlement agreements. It also approved the exhibit redactions described in Petitioners’ filing at Doc. 29-2, including personal information, confidential business information about a privately held company, settlement amounts and payment schedules, and more detailed information about underlying disputes that implicated third-party privacy interests. The court found those redactions no broader than necessary.
Order
The court ordered Petitioners to file the Petition, memorandum of law, and exhibits with the redactions authorized by the order by December 16, 2022. Judge Vernon S. Broderick further ordered that the hearing on Petitioners’ motion take place by telephone on January 6, 2023, at 12:00 p.m. The order did not decide the merits of the requested anti-suit injunction.
Read the full 6-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.