From last week's decision by Magistrate Judge Alice Senechal in N.D. Human Rights Coalition v. Patriot Front (D.N.D.):
Plaintiffs, two nonprofit organizations and an individual, moved ex parte for leave for the individual to proceed under the pseudonym "Plaintiff Doe." An ex parte order granted that motion. Because those documents were filed ex parte, they are not available to … the public. After defendants Thomas Rousseau and Trevor Valescu appeared in the action, the court directed the Clerk to provide defense counsel a copy of the order granting Plaintiff Doe permission to proceed pseudonymously.
{Plaintiffs allege several claims against defendant Patriot Front (described as a "a white supremacist group that calls for the formation of a white ethnostate"), Rousseau (Patriot Front's alleged founder and national director), and Valescu (Patriot Front's alleged "Network Director"). Plaintiffs' claims arise from Patriot Front's affiliates' alleged vandalism of the International Market Plaza in Fargo, North Dakota.}
Movant Eugene Volokh, proceeding pro se, requests to intervene under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 24(b) and requests that the motion to proceed under a pseudonym and the order granting that motion be unsealed. Volokh describes himself as a writer for the Volokh Conspiracy blog on the Reason Magazine website "who often writes about motions to seal and to proceed pseudonymously." He asserts both a common law and First Amendment right of access to the pseudonymity motion and the order granting the motion.
Plaintiff Doe opposes both requests, asserting Volokh lacks standing to intervene and Plaintiff Doe's privacy and safety interests overcome Volokh's right of access to the motion and order….
[1.] Standing
A prospective intervenor must establish Article III standing. To establish standing, a prospective intervenor must show (1) an injury, (2) causation, and (3) redressability….
A prospective intervenor, seeking to unseal judicial records, who has a right of access to those records generally satisfies standing requirements [citing district court cases -EV].
