SDNY COURTHOUSE, Sept 23 – In
Manco v. St. Joseph's University, an employment
discrimination and retaliation case that has proceeded
almost entirely under seal, plaintiff Gregory V. Manco has
filed his own declaration — pro se, since he currently has
no attorney — objecting to what he calls the unilateral
abandonment of his case by his longtime counsel, and
asking the Court to give him access to summary judgment
reply papers his own former lawyers won't send him.
Inner City Press has
separately moved in this docket to unseal the summary
judgment record entirely, on the ground that the
underlying motions, oppositions, and replies were filed
under seal without any visible order or stated
justification. Manco's declaration adds a second, more
personal dimension to that same question: a plaintiff
who no longer has a lawyer, trying to find out what the
other side has argued in a case he can't currently see.
Manco's account, filed July 28,
describes a case that came apart from the attorney side
with little warning. He retained the Zarwin Firm and
attorney Joseph M. Toddy in 2021; Toddy handled the case
through the filing of sealed summary judgment oppositions
in May 2026.
Then, on June 1, Toddy called to say he was
leaving the firm for reasons unrelated to the case, moving
to Marshall Dennehey, P.C., and would no longer represent
Manco. Eight days later, Zarwin attorney Scott Zlotnick
told Manco by email that the firm, too, would drop him —
but said he'd have 60 days to find new counsel. He didn't
get them: Zlotnick's own withdrawal was filed July 13, and
Toddy's, dated three weeks earlier, was filed by his new
firm on July 27. Manco says he had already lined up
replacement counsel, David L. Burg of a California and New
Jersey firm — but Burg isn't licensed in Pennsylvania, and
Manco says his prior lawyers have refused to stay on the
docket long enough to sponsor Burg's admission pro hac
vice, as this district's own rules on withdrawal appear to
require absent leave of court.
Left effectively unrepresented, Manco
is also asking the Court for something more specific:
access to the defendants' own sealed summary judgment
reply briefs, filed July 24, which neither of his former
firms has sent him despite his request. His stated reason
is pointed. One of the cases Hadassah Colbert and Karleigh
Lopez cited in support of their summary judgment motions,
Wang v. University of Pittsburgh, has since been reversed
by the Third Circuit. Manco's declaration asks, in effect,
whether the defendants told the Court that the ground had
shifted under a case they were relying on — a question he
says he cannot answer without seeing what they filed in
reply.
In September, Saint Joseph's University and
its co-defendants filed what is captioned as an opposition
to Inner City Press's motion to unseal the summary
judgment record in Manco v. St. Joseph's University. The
proposed order attached to that opposition tells a
different story than the caption suggests. Of the
roughly two hundred docket entries and exhibits at issue,
Defendants' own proposal keeps only two narrow categories
sealed: a single FERPA-protected educational record
(Exhibit 8), and eight specific media or video exhibits
Defendants say contain personally identifying information
that cannot be redacted. Everything else — including both
parties' full summary judgment memoranda, their supporting
exhibits A, B, and C, the Joint Statement of Undisputed
Material Facts, and the great majority of the exhibits
filed in support of and opposition to summary judgment —
Defendants propose be unsealed outright or provisionally
unsealed, subject only to a 30-day window for narrow
redactions protecting specific FERPA or personally
identifying content within otherwise public documents.
This is not the outcome of a ruling —
Judge Jeffrey L. Schmehl has not yet entered any order,
and this remains Defendants' own proposal, not a decision.
But it is a striking concession for a filing captioned as
opposition: measured by volume, Defendants are proposing
that nearly the entire summary judgment record in this
Title VII and disability discrimination case become
public, doctrine one exhibit and eight specific media
files aside.
On September 22 Inner City Press won (much)
unsealing: "MATTHEW RUSSELL LEES MOTION TO UNSEAL, DKT.
NO. [272], IS GRANTED AS FOLLOWS" - Judge Jeffrey L.
Schmehl's September 22 order grants Inner City Press's
motion to unseal (Dkt. No. 272) in three tiers: a large
number of docket entries and exhibits are unsealed
immediately, with no further steps required; a much larger
set — including both parties' full summary judgment
memoranda, their supporting exhibits, and the Joint
Statement of Undisputed Material Facts — must be redacted
for FERPA-protected or personally identifying information
within 30 days, then submitted to the Court for review
before the Clerk unseals them; and a narrow set of four
specific exhibits, plus media and video files originally
submitted in hardcopy, remain fully sealed.
That structure means most of the record is
not yet actually visible — the 30-day redaction window is
real, and unsealing of that larger tier depends on the
Court reviewing and approving what Defendants submit, not
happening automatically. But the shape of the ruling, tier
by tier, is essentially what Defendants proposed
themselves while nominally captioned as opposing Inner
City Press's motion. The same order resolves the
other thread running through this case: Joseph M. Toddy's
appearance on behalf of plaintiff Gregory Manco is
formally withdrawn, confirming in writing what Manco's own
July pro se declaration had already described — a
plaintiff left without counsel, mid-litigation, asking to
see what his own case's opposing papers argued. The Court
separately denied Manco's motions to modify the protective
order and denied Defendants' motion for contempt against
him, while granting leave for a sur-reply already deemed
filed. Inner City Press will follow the 30-day
redaction window as it plays out. Watch this site
Watch this site.
