White v. UMG Recordings, Inc.
- Analisa Torres
- 1:20-cv-09971
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In White v. UMG Recordings, Judge Torres granted sealing for four exhibits, denied it for four, and required a phone-number redaction.
The order affected Jordan White’s filings, UMG Recordings, Inc.’s confidential business information, Jordan Carter’s privacy interests, and the public’s access to the exhibits filed in the case.
What happened
In White v. UMG Recordings, Inc., Jordan White asked the court to restrict public access to portions of nine exhibits filed with his opposition to the defendants’ request for summary judgment. The defendants joined the request for six of the exhibits.
The court found that some information justified sealing. It approved limited redactions in agreements involving UMG Recordings, Inc., sealed a UMG presentation and email, and sealed portions of Jordan Carter’s deposition transcript to protect his privacy. For four other exhibits, the court found that White had not provided enough specific explanation to justify sealing them.
Judge Analisa Torres granted the motion for Exhibits 3, 4, 14, and 16. She denied the motion for Exhibits 8, 9, 11, and 15, except that White had to redact the phone number shown in Exhibit 8. The court ordered the remaining exhibits to be publicly filed, or required new filings that did not rely on them, by January 19, 2024.
The detailed version
- White v. UMG Recordings, Inc. · No. 1:20-cv-09971
- Analisa Torres
- Jan. 5, 2024
Background
Jordan White filed a letter motion asking the court to seal portions of nine exhibits supporting his opposition to the defendants’ motion for summary judgment. A motion to seal asks the court to limit public access to court filings. The defendants joined White’s request as to Exhibits 3, 4, 8, 9, 14, and 16.
Legal standard
The court explained that judicial documents generally carry a strong presumption of public access. Documents used in connection with summary judgment ordinarily should not remain sealed without the most compelling reasons. The party seeking sealing must provide a specific, document-by-document justification, and any redactions must be narrowly tailored.
Reasons for the ruling
The court found sufficient reasons to seal portions of Exhibits 3 and 4, which were agreements for production and recording services. The court had previously found that these documents implicated UMG Recordings, Inc.’s confidential business interests, and it found the proposed redactions narrowly tailored.
The court also found sealing appropriate for Exhibit 14, a PowerPoint presentation and email from UMG. According to the opinion, disclosure could harm UMG’s competitive standing by revealing business strategies, anti-piracy tools and technologies, monetization strategies, and agreements with certain streaming platforms concerning removal of infringing content.
For Exhibit 16, a deposition transcript of Jordan Carter, the court again approved the proposed redactions to protect Carter’s privacy interests and because the redacted matters were irrelevant to the action’s merits. The opinion states that the same sealing request had previously been approved by this court and Judge Ona T. Wang.
The court rejected sealing for Exhibits 8 and 9, which were text messages, and Exhibit 15, which was an email and spreadsheet. White offered only a general statement that the documents might affect UMG’s bargaining power and public standing and cause concern among artists and others connected with UMG. The court found that White did not explain specifically how the documents implicated those interests. UMG also did not provide additional justification beyond stating that Exhibits 8 and 9 contained the telephone number of an alleged non-party. White did not provide Exhibit 11 for the court’s review, so the court found no basis to seal it.
Disposition
The court granted White’s motion to seal Exhibits 3, 4, 14, and 16. It denied the motion to seal Exhibits 8, 9, 11, and 15, except that White was required to redact the phone number visible in Exhibit 8. The court ordered White, by January 19, 2024, either to file Exhibits 8, 9, 11, and 15 publicly or to file a new memorandum and declarations supporting his opposition to summary judgment that did not rely on those exhibits. The opinion’s concluding order appears to contain a typographical error referring to Exhibit “161s”; the surrounding text identifies the ruling as concerning Exhibit 16.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.