Boe v. Garcia, decided Thursday by Eleventh Circuit Judges Robert Luck, Barbara Lagoa, and Andrew Brasher, upheld a district court's denial of pseudonymity in a case where plaintiff is alleging police misconduct. The court, reviewing the district court's denial of pseudonymity for abuse of discretion (the standard of review used by federal courts in such cases), reasoned:
Generally, pleading in federal court must name all the parties. Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(a). But, under certain, highly limited circumstances, we allow plaintiffs to proceed pseudonymously. Indeed, we have held that "parties may use fictitious name[s] only in exceptional case[s]." "The ultimate test for permitting a plaintiff to proceed anonymously is whether the plaintiff has a substantial privacy right which outweighs the customary and constitutionally-embedded presumption of openness in judicial proceedings."
To decide whether privacy trumps publicity, a court must first consider "whether the party seeking anonymity (1) is challenging government activity; (2) would be compelled, absent anonymity, to disclose information of utmost intimacy; or (3) would be compelled, absent anonymity, to admit an intent to engage in illegal conduct and thus risk criminal prosecution." A court must then "carefully review all the circumstances of a given case and then decide whether the customary practice of disclosing the plaintiff's identity should yield to the plaintiff's privacy concerns." "Other factors to consider include [4] whether the party seeking anonymity is a minor or [5] faces a real threat of physical harm absent anonymity" and whether anonymity "[6] poses a unique threat of fundamental unfairness to the defendant."
