From Levy v. Shuster (né Doe v. Roe), handed down Nov. 28 but just unsealed yesterday, following the expiration of plaintiff's time to appeal:
Background. According to the allegations in the First Amended Complaint and Jury Demand …, Plaintiff and Defendant dated for nearly a year while enrolled at Tulane University … in New Orleans, Louisiana. After their relationship ended in October 2021, Defendant complained about Plaintiff's behavior to Tulane, which issued mutual no-contact orders the next month. Defendant also sought a protective order in Louisiana state court, claiming that Plaintiff stalked, harassed, shoved, and threatened her. In both proceedings, Defendant did not claim that Plaintiff sexually assaulted her. Plaintiff and Defendant agreed to a state court order, pursuant to which Tulane's no-contact order became permanent, and Plaintiff agreed to withdraw from Tulane and cease all contact with Defendant. Plaintiff alleges that he never sexually assaulted Defendant, and that he left Tulane voluntarily.
In August 2022, following a "period of reflection," Plaintiff enrolled in Front Range Community College in Boulder, Colorado, although he planned to transfer to the University of Colorado ("CU Boulder") after his first year there. At CU Boulder, Plaintiff rushed and sought to pledge an unspecified fraternity, and paid its dues. Shortly after the fraternity received his bid in September 2022, Defendant sent text messages to the fraternity's social chairs claiming, among other things, that Plaintiff transferred schools "not through his own choice, but because he was kicked out of Tulane for rape and stalking"; "sexually assaulted and raped [Ms. Shuster] countless times"; "forced [Ms. Shuster] into very uncomfortable sexual situations, forcing [her] to do painful things which [she] objected to"; "was abusive in every way"; "ha[d] been physically violent with [Defendant]"; "threatened [Defendant's] friends and family and attempted to cut [her] off from every person in [her] life"; and was "a threat to every woman's safety on [CU Boulder's] campus."
The fraternity "terminated" Plaintiff immediately, based on Defendant's allegedly defamatory claims, and refused to refund a deposit he paid. Plaintiff's college friends "cancelled him." Additionally, fraternity members "spread Ms. Shuster's malicious lies to numerous other students on campus, who proceeded to bully and ostracize Mr. Levy." Plaintiff was ultimately "forced to withdraw" from CU Boulder "and return home to California." Meanwhile, Defendant has returned to Tulane, where she continues to "publish[] her false and malicious lies to numerous students there." Seeking damages, Plaintiff has brought three claims arising out of these allegations: defamation, intrusion on seclusion, and unreasonable disclosure of private facts. Ms. Shuster has filed counterclaims for sexual assault, rape, battery, assault, stalking, cyberstalking, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and statutory violations under state and federal law..
The Court denied Mr. Levy's initial motion to prosecute this action pseudonymously on July 17, 2023, reasoning that, as Ms. Shuster and Professor Volokh [who had filed an objection to the motion] contended, no exceptional circumstances supported pseudonymity.
I wrote about that July 17 decision here. Plaintiff then sought reconsideration, but the court said no:
