FEDERAL COURT / BRIDGEPORT, July 8, 10
— Federal courts are supposed to be public; there is case
law about the public's right to access courtroom and
documents. But some Districts, some Judges, throw up
hurdles which undermine the right of access.
When Inner City Press submitted a letter to
Judge Kari A. Dooley of the United States District Court
for the District of Connecticut opposing the government's
motion to seal sentencing exhibits in United States v.
Sakal, No. 3:25-cr-00222 (KAD), the response from chambers
was swift and revealing: under Local Rule 57.1(f), a
non-party wishing to oppose sealing in a criminal case
must file a formal motion for leave to intervene. A letter
is not enough.
While seeming a needless - or
intentional - runaround, Inner City Press on June 17 ran
around and served a motion on the Clerk of Court and again
by email to the US Attorney's Office and both defense
counsel (none of the four deigned to e-confirm receipt -
must be a Connecticut thing, though one of the defense
lawyers is from New York).
Inner City Press has immediately replied - by email - [and mail, and it has been docketed]
Three
points require this reply, which is being emailed to all
counsel of record, and to chambers, given the long delay
- past the sentencing itself, coverage of which
triggered the request to unseal - in the docketing of
the previous motion.
I. The
Government's Attack on Inner City Press's Reporting Is
Irrelevant and Improper
The
government prefaces its response by noting "the proposed
intervenor's repeated public statements criticizing this
Court in its online publication," and attaches four
Inner City Press articles as Exhibits 1-4 — not for any
fact they establish about the sealed materials, but
solely to place the intervenor's viewpoint before the
Court. Inner City Press objects to this ad hominem
approach.
First,
the right of access does not depend on the identity,
motive, or viewpoint of the person asserting it. The
presumption of access attaches to judicial documents for
the benefit of the public at large; it is "not
conditioned on" the requester making any showing of need
or purpose, Lugosch v. Pyramid Co. of Onondaga, 435 F.3d
110, 123 (2d Cir. 2006), and the Second Circuit has
instructed that the motives of the party seeking access
do not diminish the presumption. See United States v.
Amodeo, 71 F.3d 1044, 1050 (2d Cir. 1995). Whatever the
government thinks of Inner City Press's coverage, the
access rights at stake belong to the public, of which
Inner City Press is a part and for which it reports.
Second,
criticism of courts is not a demerit to be weighed
against a journalist; it is speech at the core of the
First Amendment's protection. "A trial is a public
event. What transpires in the court room is public
property... Those who see and hear what transpired can
report it with impunity." Craig v. Harney, 331 U.S. 367,
374 (1947). The Supreme Court there added that judges
are expected to be persons "of fortitude, able to thrive
in a hardy climate" of public commentary. Id. at 376;
see also Bridges v. California, 314 U.S. 252 (1941);
Landmark Communications, Inc. v. Virginia, 435 U.S. 829
(1978). The government's suggestion that a publication's
criticism of a court bears on its entitlement to access
— access enjoyed identically by the most laudatory
outlet — is a suggestion that access may be rationed by
viewpoint. Cf. Sherrill v. Knight, 569 F.2d 124, 129-30
(D.C. Cir. 1977) (press access may not be denied
arbitrarily or based on the content of reporting). It
cannot be.
Third,
if anything, the government's exhibits prove the public
interest: they show that this case — a fraud prosecution
in which victims' restitution turns on the defendant's
actual finances — is being followed and reported. That
is the presumption of access working as intended.
II. On the
Merits: The Government Itself Put Sakal's Finances
Before the Court, and Ability to Pay Restitution Is a
Matter of Legitimate Public Interest
The
government's response concedes the dispositive facts. It
acknowledges that "the issue of Sakal's ability to pay"
was "raised by the government in its sentencing
memorandum and referenced at sentencing." Doc. No. 56 at
2. Under Lugosch and this Circuit's decision in Lee v.
Greenwood, 145 F.4th 248 (2d Cir. 2025) — the very case
the government cites — materials submitted to influence
a sentencing determination are judicial documents to
which the presumption of access attaches at its
strongest, and sealing requires specific, on-the-record
findings that redaction is narrowly tailored to a higher
value. The passage of Greenwood the government quotes
lists interests that "may justify redactions"; it does
not hold that a convicted defendant's finances are
categorically sealable — least of all where the
government itself deployed those finances in aid of its
sentencing and restitution positions.
The
public interest here is concrete, not abstract. Mr.
Sakal was convicted of fraud; his victims' recovery
depends on restitution; and the restitution schedule the
parties agreed to — a monthly amount the government
stresses is "not in dispute" — can only be evaluated by
the public against the defendant's actual balances,
expenditures, and assets, including any trusts or
expectancies. That the parties agree between themselves
is precisely why public scrutiny matters: the public is
entitled to assess whether a fraud defendant with
substantial undisclosed means is repaying victims at a
token monthly rate. Account balances and expenditures of
a convicted fraudster, urged on the Court by the
prosecution at sentencing, are not "family affairs,
illnesses, [or] embarrassing conduct with no public
ramifications," Greenwood, 145 F.4th at 256 — they are
the ramifications. Inner City Press has already agreed
that Social Security numbers, account and routing
numbers, personal telephone numbers, and third-party
witness identifying information should be redacted. Doc.
No. 54-1 at 3-4. What remains in dispute — the financial
substance — is what the presumption protects.
III.
Redacted Versions Filed Under Seal Are Not Redacted
Versions
Finally,
the government states that it has "filed under seal for
the Court's examination redacted versions of Exhibits 1
through 3." With respect, a redacted version filed under
seal is a contradiction in terms: the entire office of a
redacted version is to be the public version. The
government's approach — under which the prosecution and
the Court see the proposal, but the intervenor whose
motion occasioned it and the public cannot — replicates
the very problem intervention was sought to address.
Inner City Press respectfully requests that the proposed
redacted versions of Exhibits 1 through 3 be docketed
publicly, so that any remaining disputes over particular
redactions can be identified and, if necessary, briefed
with particularity; and that any redactions beyond those
Inner City Press has already conceded be supported by
the specific, on-the-record findings Lugosch and
Greenwood require.
Relief
Requested
Inner
City Press respectfully requests that the Court: (1)
grant intervention, which is unopposed; (2) direct that
the government's proposed redacted versions of
sentencing Exhibits 1 through 3 be filed on the public
docket; (3) decline to seal account balances,
expenditures, asset, trust, and ability-to-pay
information that the government itself placed before the
Court at sentencing, absent particularized findings; and
(4) disregard the government's Exhibits 1 through 4 as
irrelevant to the access analysis.
This
reply is being emailed to all counsel of record, and to
chambers, given the long delay - past the sentencing
itself, coverage of which triggered the request to
unseal - in the docketing of the previous motion.
Inner City Press is familiar with the
intervention procedure in many federal district courts. It
is not, however, what courts in the same Second Circuit
require. In the Southern District of New York — where Lee
v. Greenwood, 145 F.4th 248 (2d Cir. 2025) was decided,
recognizing the First Amendment right of non-party media
organizations to be heard on sealing motions — Inner City
Press sends a letter to chambers, and it is docketed and
the parties given time to respond.
The same is true in the District of
Massachusetts, where ICP's letter opposing sealing in UMG
Recordings v. Suno was docketed as Docket 233 without any
formal motion to intervene being required. In the District
of Maryland, Judge Matthew J. Maddox recently docketed
ICP's letter opposing wholesale sealing of a sentencing
memorandum the same day it was received. In the District
of Colorado, Local Rule 7.2(d) expressly invites "any
interested party" to file a response to a restriction
motion — no intervention motion required. Inner City Press
has a Zoom hearing there on June 24 on an application to
unseal.
The District of Connecticut's Local Rule
57.1(f) is different. It requires a formal motion for
leave to intervene. That motion must be docketed — which
for a non-attorney means appearing at the Clerk's Office
in Bridgeport or navigating the court's CM/ECF system,
which requires special authorization. The motion must then
be briefed and opposed, and the court must rule on the
intervention question before even reaching the sealing
question. The practical consequence is a meaningful
procedural barrier that does not exist in other courts in
the same circuit.
Lee v. Greenwood is binding precedent in
the District of Connecticut — the Second Circuit governs
both SDNY and CTD. The First Amendment right recognized in
that case, including Inner City Press's right to be heard
on sealing motions, applies with equal force in Bridgeport
as in Manhattan. But the procedural path to exercising
that right is substantially longer and more burdensome in
Bridgeport. The underlying case illustrates why this
matters.
Salim Sakal, 55, a Brooklyn jeweler who
pleaded guilty to conspiring with a Colombian burglary
ring to fence more than $4.4 million in stolen jewelry
from mall-based kiosks in six states, is scheduled for
sentencing before Judge Dooley. The government moved to
seal three sentencing exhibits: Sakal's financial
statement submitted to the US Attorney's Office, and
police reports of crimes committed against Sakal and his
jewelry business. Those police reports — government
documents describing crimes against the defendant — are
among the most public-facing law enforcement records that
exist. That they are being sealed in a sentencing
proceeding, and that the procedure to oppose that sealing
requires more steps in Connecticut than in any neighboring
federal district, is a major problem.
Watch this site.
Update 1: On June 22, 2026, the US
Attorney's Office notified Inner City Press by email —
copying Judge Dooley's chambers and defense counsel — that
the Court would take no action on any motion until it is
docketed, and reminded Inner City Press how to do so.
Inner City Press replied the same day that it had mailed
the motion package to the Clerk of Court on June 20, that
USPS delivery had been attempted and would be re-attempted
that day, and that a tracking screenshot was attached.
The exchange illustrates the barrier
precisely. Inner City Press cannot use the District of
Connecticut's CM/ECF electronic filing system — because
non-party news organizations do not receive ECF filing
privileges without retained (paid) local counsel. That
means the only way to docket a motion challenging a
sealing order in the District of Connecticut is to mail
paper to Bridgeport and wait for a postal carrier. . In
the District of Massachusetts, a letter got docketed as
ECF No. 233 in the Suno case the same day it was filed. In
the District of Maryland, Judge Maddox docketed Inner City
Press's letter the day it arrived. In the District of
Connecticut, the motion is waiting for USPS re-delivery to
a Clerk's Office, mailed four days ago. The sentencing of
Salim Sakal proceeded, with judgment not yet docketed. The
motion challenging the sealed exhibits has not yet been
docketed. The public's right of access under Lee v.
Greenwood is being held at the post office.
UPDATE 2 - Salim Sakal was sentenced by
Judge Dooley on June 22, 2026 — then the US Attorney's
office notified Inner City Press that the Court would take
no action until the motion was docketed. The sentencing
hearing lasted one hour and twenty-five minutes. An
exhibit list was filed. The government's oral motion for
acceptance of responsibility was granted. An Arabic
interpreter was present. The sealed financial statement
and police reports that Inner City Press sought to unseal
were part of the record on which Judge Dooley sentenced
Sakal. Inner City Press's motion package was in the mail.
The public's right to understand the factual basis for the
sentence expired with the hearing. The motion is still
waiting for USPS re-delivery in Bridgeport.
Update 3 - press release emailed to Inner City Press by US
Attorney's Office (thanks, but see below): "David X.
Sullivan, United States Attorney for the District of
Connecticut, announced that SALIM SAKAL, 55, of Brooklyn,
New York, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Kari
A. Dooley in Bridgeport to 24 months of imprisonment and
three years of supervised release for buying and selling
jewelry stolen from mall-based stores and kiosks across
the country. According to court documents and
statements made in court, between May 2023 and April 2024,
an organized jewelry theft ring of Colombian nationals
burglarized jewelry stores and kiosks in malls in
Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, New Jersey, Ohio, and
Virginia. The total losses from the burglaries
exceed $4.4 million. Members of the conspiracy also
cased additional jewelry stores and kiosks in Iowa,
Indiana, Wisconsin, Illinois, and
Delaware.
Sakal was the co-owner of Ramoun Jewelry, located in
Corona, New York."
Meanwhile, beyond the still sealed
filings, this: "JUDICIAL PROCEEDINGS SURVEY - FOR COUNSEL
ONLY: The following link to the confidential survey
requires you to log into CM/ECF for SECURITY purposes.
Once in CM/ECF you will be prompted for the case number.
Although you are receiving this survey through CM/ECF, it
is hosted on an independent website called SurveyMonkey.
Once in SurveyMonkey, the survey is located in a secure
account. The survey is not docketed and it is not sent
directly to the judge. To ensure anonymity, completed
surveys are held up to 90 days before they are sent to the
judge for review. We hope you will take this opportunity
to participate, please click on this link:
https://ecf.ctd.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/Dispatch.pl?crsurvey
(jr) (Entered: 06/22/2026)." We have a review - but it is
not invited or allowed. But we have replied. Watch this
site.