Khan v. Colvin

Filing 16

ORDER granting 15 Motion to Seal. Signed by Magistrate Judge Peggy A. Leen on 12/9/13. (Copies have been distributed pursuant to the NEF - MMM)

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1 DANIEL G. BOGDEN United States Attorney 2 BLAINE T. WELSH Assistant United States Attorney 3 Nevada State Bar No. 4790 333 South Las Vegas Blvd. Suite 5000 4 Las Vegas, NV 89101 Ph: (702) 388-6336 5 Fax: (702) 388-6787 Email: Blaine.Welsh@usdoj.gov 6 Attorneys for the United States 7 8 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF NEVADA 9 10 KHALID HASAN KHAN, 11 Plaintiff, 12 v. 13 CAROLYN W. COLVIN 1, Acting Commissioner of Social Security, 14 Defendant. 15 ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) Case No: 2:13-cv-01173-GMN-PAL DEFENDANT’S MOTION TO SEAL DECLARATION OF GLENN HAAS AND ALL DOCUMENTS APPENDED TO IT 16 I. 17 INTRODUCTION Pursuant to LR 10-5, Defendant respectfully requests that the Court seal the declaration of 18 19 Glenn Haas and all documents attached to it. The Haas declaration and appended documents are 20 attached as an Exhibit to Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss that is being filed concurrently with this 21 Motion to Seal. This case involves allegations that the Social Security Administration (SSA) made 22 incorrect decisions about Plaintiff’s age and entitlement to age related benefits. In most cases seeking 23 review of benefit decisions made by the SSA, this Court limits access to the file to the Plaintiff and 24 1 Carolyn W. Colvin became the Acting Commissioner of Social Security on February 14, 2013. Pursuant to Rule 25(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Carolyn W. Colvin should be 25 substituted for Michael J. Astrue as the defendant in this suit. No further action need be taken to 26 continue this suit by reason of the last sentence of section 205(g) of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. § 405(g). 1 any counsel for the SSA. This is done to avoid the heavy redaction and multiple filings that would 2 otherwise be necessary to redact sensitive information from the documents submitted to the court 3 because these cases deals extensively with personally identifiable information, medical records, 4 financial data and other sensitive data. In this case, however, the court did not limit access to this file 5 and the documents filed in it are all accessible to the public. 6 Defendant is uncertain why access was not limited but it may be due to the fact that Plaintiff 7 claimed jurisdiction under the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”), 5 U.S.C. § 702 et seq. 8 (complaint at 1:17-19, 22-26,) rather than section 405(g) of the Social Security Act (“Act”), 42 9 U.S.C. § 405(g)-(h). 10 Regardless of the reason, however, this case does not have the normal limited access 11 restriction, and the Haas Declaration and attachments to it contains sensitive information that should 12 not be subject to public view, including personally identifiable information and financial data. 13 Further, redaction of the sensitive information is not practicable without considerable difficulty and 14 the risk that the meaning of some of the documents may be obscured. 15 For these reasons, Defendant respectfully requests that the Declaration of Glenn Haas attached 16 to the Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss and all documents appended to the Haas Declaration be sealed. 17 Respectfully submitted this 27th day of November 2013. 18 DANIEL G. BOGDEN United States Attorney 19 /s/ Blaine T. Welsh BLAINE T. WELSH Assistant United States Attorney 20 21 22 OF COUNSEL: IT IS SO ORDERED this 9th day of December 2013. 23 DONNA L. CALVERT Acting Regional Chief Counsel 24 ELLINOR R. CODER 25 Assistant Regional Counsel Social Security Administration 26 _______________________________ Peggy A. Leen United States Magistrate Judge 2

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