SDNY COURTHOUSE, July 30 – Unsealing
wrongful hidden court filings is a task Inner City Press
has undertaken first in the U.S. District Court for the
Southern District of New York, most recently in the Live
Nation trial,
and in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, in the OneCoin
/ Sebastian Greenwood case.
Inner City Press has been seeking
unsealing in the District for the District of Columbia of
the Libya / Pan Am 103 case against Abu Agila Mohammad
Mas'ud Kheir Al-Marimi. On May 27, citing recent docketing
of Press emailed unsealing requests in the District
of Massachusetts, EDNY,
SDNY and even DDC
- this
judge - in the past, Inner City Press wrote to Judge
Dabney L. Friedrich challenging
"the sealing of the unredacted Motion to
Exclude or Limit Testimony of Proffered Metallurgy Expert
filed under seal at Docket 447-1, pursuant to the Court's
Minute Order of May 15, 2026... The admissibility of
metallurgy expert testimony goes directly to the core of
the government's proof at trial — the physical evidence
linking the defendant to the bomb's construction. The
public, the victims' families, and the press have a
compelling interest in understanding the evidentiary
disputes that will shape the trial's outcome."
Not this or the rest of the letter,
but only this was docketed: "The Court has received via
email an unsealing request from Inner City Press as to the
government's Motion to Exclude or Limit the Testimony of
Proffered Metallurgy Expert, a redacted copy of which
already appears on the public docket. See Dkt. 446. The
request is DENIED because the Court does not accept
letters. See Local Civil Rule 5.1(a). So Ordered by Judge
Dabney L. Friedrich on May 27, 2026."
That rule says "Except when
requested by a judge, correspondence shall not be directed
by the parties or their attorneys to a judge, nor shall
papers be left with or mailed to a judge for filing. (b)
FACSIMILE OR EMAIL. No document shall be transmitted to
the Clerk for filing by means of electronic facsimile or
email transmission except with express leave of Court."
But see below - and, in DDC, 26-mc-89 DLF, filing on
CourtListener here
Having excluded the Press and public, later on May 27 a filing went in. The government filed on May 27 its opposition (Dkt. 471) to the defense's motion to limit or exclude its metallurgy expert, Dr. Yu-Lung Chiu of the University of Birmingham. The central issue: a fragment of printed circuit board known as PT/35(b), which the government says originated from a MEBO timer — the same type used in the Lockerbie bomb. Scottish authorities commissioned metallurgical testing in 2012 and 2013; Dr. Chiu personally analyzed the raw data and independently concluded that PT/35(b) did originate from a MEBO timer. That testimony, if admitted, is a pillar of the government's case.
On June 3, 2026, the government filed
its reply brief (Dkt. 477) in support of its motion to
exclude the defense's metallurgy expert, Dr. Elizabeth
Buc. The government's core argument: Dr. Buc's expert
notice fails to state what her actual opinions are. She
has been noticed to testify about whether the government
expert's analysis "conformed to the principle" of
independent analysis and whether it "reflects confirmation
bias" — but the notice never says what her conclusion is.
Did she find confirmation bias or not? The government
argues that stating a topic without stating an opinion is
not a "complete" statement under Federal Rule of Criminal
Procedure 16(a)(1)(G)(iii), and the Court should not
permit a mid-trial amendment of the notice.
The PT/35(b) fragment — the piece of
printed circuit board the government says came from a MEBO
timer, making it a physical link between the defendant and
the Lockerbie bomb — is at the center of the dispute. The
defense has argued that "a question arose regarding the
provenance" of PT/35(b) following the Scottish trial. The
government's reply calls that framing misleading: the
defense has had the government's metallurgy notice since
October 8, 2025, sought and received an extension of its
responsive notice deadline, and has had "ample
opportunity" to draft a notice stating any affirmative
opinions it actually intends to elicit. The government is
asking Friedrich to hold the line — no new opinions, no
mid-trial amendments.
All of this is being litigated in the
public courtroom — orally, on the record — while the
written motion papers remain sealed or redacted. Inner
City Press's unsealing request, which Friedrich denied
because DDC does not accept letters, sought exactly the
unredacted written arguments now being argued in open
court. The public can hear the lawyers argue but cannot
read what they wrote. That asymmetry — oral argument
public, written record sealed — is what the LCrR 57.6
Miscellaneous filing process is designed to correct
Inner City Press wrote to Judge
Friedrich seeking the unredacted version — and Friedrich
docketed a denial, saying DDC does not accept letters. The
District of Columbia — home to the most consequential
federal prosecutions in America — could be viewed less
accessible to the press than Massachusetts, SDNY, EDNY, or
even DDC itself in past years. See, e.g, days ago in the
District of Massachusetts, this.
If the Press can't similarly
challenge oversealing in DDC, by email, then how?
Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqi told Inner City Press to raise
it with Chief Judge James Boasberg's special assistant
Lisa Klem, and it did. Twice by letter - no answer - and
once by phone - a promise to revert, never fulfilled.
But there is another DDC rule:
LCrR 57.6 APPLICATIONS FOR RELIEF IN A CRIMINAL CASE OR MATTER BY PERSONS NOT PARTIES TO THE CASE Any news organization or other interested person, other than a party or a subpoenaed witness, who seeks relief relating to any aspect of the proceedings in a criminal case, or relief relating to a criminal investigative or grand jury matter, shall file an application for such relief in the Miscellaneous Docket of with the Court. The application shall include a statement of the applicant's interest in the matter as to which relief is sought, a statement of facts, and a specific prayer for relief. An application that pertains to a criminal case or matter to which a judge has been assigned The application shall be served on the parties to the criminal case and shall be referred by the Clerk to the trial assigned judge assigned to the criminal case for determination. An application that pertains to a criminal investigative or grand jury matter to which no judge has been assigned shall be referred by the Clerk to the Chief Judge for determination.
Sounds good, despite the $52
filing fee.
In DDC, Inner City Press noted 50 "sz"
(seizure) cases, and asked Magistrate Judge Zia M. Faruqui
who had said he'd docket one of his cases to do so. Judge
Faruqui to his credit referred Inner City Press to the
Special Assistant to Chief Judge James E. Boasberg, Lisa
Klem, with whom it has spoken by phone, first about the
January 6 cases and now about these "sz"
cases.
Magistrate Judge Matthew J. Sharbaugh
has recently unsealed
three cases. But more than 70 remain, some of them sure to
relate to ships and other items already
seized.
On June 4 Inner City Press submitted
a MISC filing, and it has now been assigned a docket
number, and assigned to Judge Friedrich: 26-mc-89 DLF, now
on CourtListener here
After ten days - ten - Judge Friedrich
docketed: "MINUTE ORDER directing the petitioner to serve
his motion on the parties in criminal case 22-cr-392 in
accordance with Local Criminal Rule 57.6. So Ordered by
Judge Dabney L. Friedrich on June 14, 2026."
So Inner City Press emailed the application to the US
Attorney's Office (two attorneys) and Federal Defenders
(two attorneys) with a certificate to the Office of the
Clerk of DDC.
On June 15 the US Attorney's Office, to its
credit, confirmed receipt. But despite a re-send, twice to
FD's Laura Koenig and Whitney Ninter, the Federal
Defenders did not. This is why Judge Friedrich
should have just put the letter seeking unseaking into the
docket weeks ago, and had them respond. Note that in
many LCrR
57.6
cases in DDC there appears to be no such certificate
of service in the docket.
This
process was meant to make it more straightforward for
the media to ask to unseal.
Two of the three items Inner City Press sought were denied for the simplest possible reason: they had already become fully public. Docket Entry 460, Al-Marimi's objections to the government's Arabic translations, is unsealed and on the docket. Docket Entry 477, the government's reply brief on excluding a defense metallurgy expert, is likewise fully public — Judge Friedrich even declined, gently, Inner City Press's separate request to correct its docket-text label, explaining that the "(Partially Redacted)" tag plainly refers to a different, earlier filing and does not limit access to 477 itself. Neither of those rulings costs Inner City Press anything real; the documents sought were already where they should be.
The substantive fight was over Docket Entries 468 and 475 — Al-Marimi's own annotated version of his alleged statement to investigators, and attachments to his objections concerning "Fhimah's Diary," a reference to Lamin Khalifah Fhimah, a co-defendant in the original Lockerbie prosecution decades ago in Scotland. Here Judge Friedrich held that Al-Marimi's fair trial rights — with trial approaching — outweigh the public interest for now, applying the six-factor Hubbard test and the First Amendment's compelling-interest standard. She noted, accurately, that Inner City Press had not shown the public previously had access to these specific documents, and that a generalized public interest is not the same as a documented one.
Here is the part worth watching. Judge Friedrich did not simply deny and close the file. She wrote: "Although the Court determines that sealing remains appropriate at this time, the Court notes that this assessment may change in light of trial developments. For example, absent compelling circumstances, trial exhibits will be made available to the public by counsel for the government... the Court's ruling regarding public access to the statement and related documents is subject to modification as the trial progresses." As to the Fhimah's Diary attachments specifically, she wrote that copies "will be made available to the public if the attachments are ultimately admitted in evidence at trial." Sealing today; unsealing built into the calendar tomorrow, once trial actually begins.
One footnote deserves notice for what it settles cleanly, in Inner City Press's favor, without fanfare: Judge Friedrich confirmed that in this Circuit, "the D.C. Circuit has treated the press's right of access as coterminous with the general public's" — rejecting, in a single citation to CNN, Inc. v. FBI, any suggestion that a journalist's standing to seek access is weaker than any other member of the public's.
This is the fifth entry in a
series that began with a minute order that DDC "does not
accept letters," and continued through a Federal Defenders
office that would not confirm receipt of a served motion.
Now we have this fourteen-page order, from a judge who left
herself room to revisit it. Inner City Press plans to do
more in the District Court for the District of Columbia.
Watch this site.
