[00:00:00] Speaker 00:
In case number 24.1790, Fadil Abdel-Adi Abad versus George Washington University Adab, Ms.

[00:00:09] Speaker 00:
Abdel-Adi for the acknowledge and Ms.

[00:00:11] Speaker 00:
Abdel-Adi for the endorsement.

[00:00:13] Speaker 03:
Good morning, Your Honors.

[00:00:15] Speaker 03:
May it please the court, Hadil Abdelhadi, on behalf of myself.

[00:00:19] Speaker 03:
We have in this case two orders that are an issue.

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One, denying a motion to seal on remand from this court.

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And the second, sua sponte unsealing documents that were filed in support of the motion to seal and that had been sealed for nearly two years when the district court on its own initiative unsealed them.

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This court has a jurisdiction under 28 USC 1291 from a final decision.

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The district court entered a final decision in February of 2025 after this appeal was taken.

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Before that, the court had jurisdiction under the collateral order doctrine that I believe is no longer an issue.

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On the merits, the documents that are in issue are 16 non-public documents that the George Washington University filed with its Rule 12b6 and summary judgment replies.

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Importantly in this matter, those replies and the motions that it filed were companion documents, essentially one motion.

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The district court on remand in the remand order made the important finding that the documents were in fact nonpublic the district courts languages they were initially nonpublic until of course GW filed them on the public docket.

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That is not in dispute.

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The university didn't contest that below that it claims in its brief or it refers to the documents as public documents.

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It didn't challenge that finding below and it didn't cross appeal.

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So it can't dispute that now.

[00:01:58] Speaker 02:
So we review the district court's determination on ceiling for abuse of discretion, which is a fairly lenient standard.

[00:02:07] Speaker 02:
So how do you get past that standard?

[00:02:09] Speaker 02:
Where's the abuse of discretion?

[00:02:11] Speaker 03:
Okay, well, there are, yes, there are multiple abuses of discretion and I'll get to those, but let me know first that there is also a legal question here that you reviewed de novo, and that is whether the documents are judicial records and that's CNN V, FBI and other cases.

[00:02:26] Speaker 03:
On the abuse of discretion point, there are two principal issues.

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One is that the district court's factual findings are erroneous.

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Its characterizations of the documents are not correct.

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For example, when it states that the documents, including GW's 12b6 reply, which is an issue, do not contain medical information, that's not factually accurate.

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They do contain medical information.

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The first exhibit to the summary judgment reply contains medical information.

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abuse of discretion.

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With regard to the district court's suesponte unsealing of the motion to seal and its exhibits, the district court's basis for that in the footnote that addresses it, not applying the Hubbard factors at all, the district court stated that the documents were public docket.

[00:03:15] Speaker 03:
They were not public docket.

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In fact, one of the exhibits is a sealed docket from the DC Court of Appeals.

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The other is a DOES docket that is not public, that is not in dispute.

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And the other documents are, ironically, HHS determinations that the university or medical providers in response to its subpoenas violated HIPAA rules in disclosing medical records.

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Those documents also contain medical information.

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The district court characterized those as agency records as if they are public.

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They are not public, they were never public, and they were filed to

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the privacy interest that I asserted in the motion to seal.

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So those are abuses of discretion.

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In addition, the district court stated, again, that GW16 documents do not contain medical information that's not disclosed in the complaint.

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But this court in Abdul Haiti 1 already examined the record and determined that, in fact,

[00:04:15] Speaker 03:
the district court was wrong in the initial order, and it is wrong again in this remand order.

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So that's the abuse of discretion, or those are the abuses.

[00:04:23] Speaker 02:
My understanding of this, this court's first decision was that the district court had not given sufficient explanation, which isn't to say that the decision was incorrect.

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On remand, the district court did provide

[00:04:38] Speaker 02:
much fuller explanation of its determinations.

[00:04:42] Speaker 03:
Well, yes, it is true that the district court or the initial ruling from this court was that the district court did not provide explanation.

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However, in the decision, this court also explicitly stated that the district court incorrectly determined that the documents that GW filed did not contain medical information that was disclosed in the amended complaint that's redacted.

[00:05:07] Speaker 03:
So that was a factual error, and this court specifically stated that in the Abdul-Hadi I decision.

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This court also stated that the medical information should be under seal, and it is not under seal.

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Some of it is under seal, and some of it isn't.

[00:05:24] Speaker 03:
I'd like to also, Judge Rao, pick up on your point about the fuller explanation provided here.

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We have to maintain a dichotomy between the medical information and the non-medical information that is in the public or the non-public documents.

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The district court did not apply the Hubbard factors, the five, to the public documents.

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It only applied it to the medical information.

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But we have two distinct categories of issue.

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So the district court did not provide a full explanation on remand.

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It did so with regard to the medical information, although it did make factual errors.

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But we don't have a full explanation and we don't have application of the five factors.

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And the district court does not have discretion to not apply the five factors.

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That is not a discretionary exercise.

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With regard to the question of judicial records, the 16 documents that GW filed are not judicial records.

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They are not subject to the public access doctrine for two reasons.

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One is because they were filed in bad faith and for improper purposes.

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The university explicitly stated in its 12b6 reply more than once that they were public documents, that they were public records.

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They were not.

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It's never substantiated that.

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So that was a bad, safe way to get the documents into the record on the public document for the purpose of avoiding conversion under Rule 12D.

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because the university asked the court to take judicial notice.

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And the public documents misrepresentation was essential to that.

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The second reason is because the district court states in the remand order that when it applied the first Hubbard factor, it stated that it considered the documents or the documents, excuse me, the public had a need to access the documents because GW filed them to refute and rebut the allegations and the complaint.

[00:07:13] Speaker 03:
GW had no right to do so in a 12B6 motion, not in a reply, and not without conversion under rule 12D.

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So the judicial records assumption that the district court makes throughout this remand order is not a correct assumption.

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That's a legal question that this court reviews de novo.

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League of Women Voters in Ray Seale case, the FEC case, and MetLife underscores that documents submitted into the record on the public docket in bad faith for improper purposes are not subject to the public access doctrine.

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This is an atypical case.

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And there is no question that the university misrepresented the documents as public record.

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That's in its replies.

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So those, we don't have a public access doctrine case.

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If we did have a public access doctrine case, reversal would still be warranted for the same reason that the first minute order was reversed in the first appeal.

[00:08:13] Speaker 03:
The court again stated that there was a public need, the first factor, because GW filed them to refute and rebut.

[00:08:21] Speaker 03:
That is not public need.

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As this court made clear in a case like EEOC, the National Children's Center, public need connotes some kind of a civic need.

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We don't have that fear.

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We simply have a party filing something on the docket improperly and misrepresenting what those documents were.

[00:08:39] Speaker 04:
In terms of prior... Let me ask you, of the 16 documents to which you refer that GW filed,

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How many are still in dispute in the sense that they have not been sealed and they have not been redacted?

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All of the 16 documents, excuse me.

[00:09:03] Speaker 03:
Every one of them?

[00:09:04] Speaker 03:
No, no.

[00:09:04] Speaker 03:
I'm sorry, Your Honor.

[00:09:05] Speaker 03:
I don't want to misspeak.

[00:09:06] Speaker 03:
That is not correct.

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I was going to say all of the 16.

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Some of the documents have been redacted pursuant to the district court's remand order.

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But how many remain unredacted?

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The first exhibit to the summary judgment reply remains unredacted and it contains medical information.

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And that exhibit is a single medical record?

[00:09:34] Speaker 03:
It's actually not a medical record.

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It's a DOES document that contains medical information.

[00:09:39] Speaker 03:
A DOES Department of Employment Services?

[00:09:44] Speaker 03:
Yes, Your Honor.

[00:09:45] Speaker 03:
And what kind of document is it?

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It is a claim document.

[00:09:51] Speaker 03:
So was it part of the workers' compensation?

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claim.

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That's right.

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It was the document that initiated that that initially was the filing document has not been sealed.

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That document has not been sealed.

[00:10:05] Speaker 04:
It was sealed by DOES by operation of law.

[00:10:10] Speaker 03:
Correct.

[00:10:11] Speaker 03:
It was not sealed by the DOES.

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It was never publicly accessible, but it was.

[00:10:17] Speaker 04:
You made these arguments to the district court.

[00:10:20] Speaker 04:
Yes.

[00:10:21] Speaker 04:
And I submitted evidence.

[00:10:22] Speaker 04:
What was its response as to this one document?

[00:10:26] Speaker 03:
Well, initially, in the first minute order, the district court didn't address it.

[00:10:32] Speaker 03:
In the remand order that's on appeal now, the district court does not address any of the documents.

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He does not address the claim document at all.

[00:10:42] Speaker 03:
I believe the district court does not specifically address that document.

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It is not one of the documents that it ordered sealed.

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And I'd like to, I can double check that.

[00:10:54] Speaker 04:
I'm calling counsel, excuse me.

[00:10:56] Speaker 04:
But what I'm trying to figure out is where are you in this case?

[00:11:04] Speaker 04:
There are things that you still want sealed or redacted.

[00:11:11] Speaker 04:
That's correct.

[00:11:13] Speaker 04:
Findings by the district court that you say are erroneous as a matter of fact.

[00:11:24] Speaker 04:
The district court has ruled and has it not essentially issued a meet and confer order to you and GW University?

[00:11:39] Speaker 03:
Yes, the district court did issue.

[00:11:42] Speaker 04:
Can all of these issues be resolved?

[00:11:46] Speaker 04:
Just take a hypothetical here.

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You and GW, you meet, you reach agreement, and you submit a statement to the district court to that effect.

[00:12:02] Speaker 04:
Is that contemplated by the remand?

[00:12:05] Speaker 03:
That is not content order on remit.

[00:12:08] Speaker 03:
Yeah, I don't read the order that way with the district court not happen I don't believe it can in other words.

[00:12:16] Speaker 04:
You've been up here now a couple of times.

[00:12:18] Speaker 04:
That's right and One of the reasons oral argument can be helpful is to anticipate in order to avoid still another appeal

[00:12:34] Speaker 04:
where you are claiming factual error by the district court as well as legal error.

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And I will ask counsel for GWU exactly what interests they have in fighting this.

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So I understand why if there are records

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When I think of medical records, I think of diagnoses, I think of tests, I think of examination records.

[00:13:10] Speaker 04:
Why?

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It has an interest in having those documents public when it has, I don't want to say settled, but the worker's compensation claim is over, although I know you don't think that was enough.

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But that's a different issue.

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So what's remaining in this case?

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If we just send it back to the district court and say, you made a mistake here, and you didn't do that there, then you'll come back and say, but he didn't do everything I want.

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And I thought the district court was trying to say, here on remand, here's my position, and I'm explaining it.

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And I'm not going to sit here, I think these are almost his words, and go through this document by document, but let the parties work this out.

[00:14:06] Speaker 03:
Um, well, and thank you for that practical aspect because that's exactly what's going to happen is we probably will come back.

[00:14:12] Speaker 03:
I will come back.

[00:14:13] Speaker 03:
I will appeal again and I don't want to do that.

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And I don't think I should be.

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I don't think I should be here for a second time, but no, it'd be more than a second time.

[00:14:20] Speaker 04:
No, I mean, this is why isn't the district courts meet and confer.

[00:14:28] Speaker 04:
Position the way this can be resolved.

[00:14:32] Speaker 03:
Well, I don't read the ruling as a meet and confer.

[00:14:38] Speaker 03:
I read it as the district court having made a decision about specific documents.

[00:14:43] Speaker 03:
And it said, I'm not going to go through all this.

[00:14:46] Speaker 03:
The party should meet and confer.

[00:14:48] Speaker 03:
That's right.

[00:14:49] Speaker 03:
It said that the parties that GW should confer with the plaintiff about the specific documents that are within the scope of the order.

[00:14:58] Speaker 03:
That is not all of the documents.

[00:15:00] Speaker 03:
And what else is there?

[00:15:02] Speaker 04:
Well, there's 16 documents and there's this one document that you identify as a claim.

[00:15:08] Speaker 04:
That's all that you're fighting about now.

[00:15:11] Speaker 03:
No, I need to correct myself.

[00:15:13] Speaker 03:
It's not the only document.

[00:15:14] Speaker 03:
That's one that contains medical information, as does GW's reply rule 12b6.

[00:15:21] Speaker 03:
So that's 17 documents?

[00:15:24] Speaker 03:
That's 17 with that rule.

[00:15:26] Speaker 03:
That's correct with the 12b6 reply.

[00:15:28] Speaker 03:
The issue still outstanding that the district court does not address in the remand order is that these documents were not public.

[00:15:36] Speaker 03:
They were submitted by the university.

[00:15:38] Speaker 04:
The court is well aware of this argument.

[00:15:43] Speaker 04:
Okay.

[00:15:44] Speaker 04:
It ruled.

[00:15:47] Speaker 04:
All right.

[00:15:48] Speaker 04:
And then it said meeting confer.

[00:15:52] Speaker 03:
Well, I would be happy to meet and confer, but I'd also want to confer about the non-public status of these documents and the manner in which they made their way into the public document.

[00:16:05] Speaker 04:
Meet and confer, in my question, speculates that were the parties to meet and confer, this might all be resolved.

[00:16:20] Speaker 04:
Well, I don't understand.

[00:16:23] Speaker 04:
why GW would want to make public information that it will be able to use in litigation that you have brought.

[00:16:35] Speaker 04:
But why would it also want to make this public in terms of any document that you and the district court agree is a medical record?

[00:16:49] Speaker 03:
Well, I believe all to you, but the important point here, your honor, is that the reason why the university wanted these to be public is because it wanted the district court to take judicial notice.

[00:17:01] Speaker 03:
Without the public record claim, the district court can't take judicial notice under 12b-6.

[00:17:07] Speaker 03:
What do you mean, judicial notice?

[00:17:09] Speaker 03:
Of what?

[00:17:10] Speaker 03:
Of your medical record?

[00:17:11] Speaker 04:
Of the 16 documents.

[00:17:13] Speaker 04:
But they're all personal to you.

[00:17:15] Speaker 04:
Correct.

[00:17:15] Speaker 04:
And you're making claims based on those records.

[00:17:21] Speaker 03:
Well, I'm making claims.

[00:17:22] Speaker 03:
Actually, I'm not making claims based on these particular records, but that's a merits question.

[00:17:26] Speaker 03:
No, no, no, no.

[00:17:28] Speaker 04:
You're not making any claims based on these 16 records?

[00:17:32] Speaker 04:
No.

[00:17:32] Speaker 04:
All you're trying to do is make them non-public.

[00:17:38] Speaker 04:
Correct.

[00:17:39] Speaker 04:
You're not trying to prevent GW from using them.

[00:17:44] Speaker 04:
That's right.

[00:17:44] Speaker 04:
Defending against whatever claims you may make.

[00:17:47] Speaker 04:
That's right.

[00:17:50] Speaker 03:
All right.

[00:17:51] Speaker 03:
But again, and I know I'm way over time here, but again, the way that these documents got into the record in the first place.

[00:17:59] Speaker 03:
We heard 17 times.

[00:18:01] Speaker 00:
Thank you.

[00:18:24] Speaker 01:
Morning, may I please the court?

[00:18:26] Speaker 01:
My name is Jared Emig and I represent the George Washington University.

[00:18:31] Speaker 01:
Your honor, before I go into my outline, if I could respond to your question that you just raised, why does George Washington care?

[00:18:39] Speaker 01:
And that's a question that we've grappled with.

[00:18:42] Speaker 04:
No, no, my question is, why does GW have an interest in making medical records, which it can use in defending itself against the plaintiff's claims?

[00:18:58] Speaker 04:
of making the medical records publicly available to the general public.

[00:19:06] Speaker 04:
What interest does GW have when its own interests are fully protected if they're not public?

[00:19:16] Speaker 01:
I agree.

[00:19:16] Speaker 01:
And I think the problem of the medical records has been resolved.

[00:19:20] Speaker 01:
I think this court's remand order in Abdul-Hadi won.

[00:19:24] Speaker 01:
The meat of it focused on medical information, the diagnoses, the doctors, the treatment.

[00:19:31] Speaker 01:
And Judge McFadden in his remand was very clear on that, that he weighed the Hubbard factors and he took light of this court's ruling and held that there is no need for the public access doctrine has to take a backseat with respect to the medical records.

[00:19:51] Speaker 01:
So what Judge McFadden did was he ordered defendant GW to file redacted exhibits that make reference to treating doctors and injuries, specifically injuries that are not described in plaintiff's redacted amended complaint, because plaintiff already put those.

[00:20:10] Speaker 01:
And we did that.

[00:20:11] Speaker 01:
We complied with Judge McFadden's order.

[00:20:14] Speaker 01:
I disagree with Ms.

[00:20:15] Speaker 01:
Abdelhadi on that one exhibit, the exhibit one, which was the claim form that contained the name of the treating physician.

[00:20:24] Speaker 01:
Judge McFadden ordered us to file the redactions.

[00:20:28] Speaker 01:
We did that.

[00:20:29] Speaker 01:
The redacted copies are now filed.

[00:20:32] Speaker 04:
So there's nothing that's generally available to the public?

[00:20:35] Speaker 01:
With respect to the medical treatment, no, Your Honor, unless that one carve out, and that carve out is if the cat's already out of the bag because of the redacted amended complaint.

[00:20:48] Speaker 04:
So what's the issue here?

[00:20:50] Speaker 01:
The issue, as I understand it, are these 16 exhibits that George Washington filed in support of.

[00:20:59] Speaker 01:
George Washington filed the two dispositive motions, motion to dismiss, motion for partial summary judgment.

[00:21:05] Speaker 01:
Ms.

[00:21:05] Speaker 01:
Abdul-Hady opposed them, and we filed replies.

[00:21:09] Speaker 04:
But have those 16 documents either been sealed or redacted by the district court now?

[00:21:16] Speaker 01:
Yes, with respect.

[00:21:18] Speaker 04:
So those aren't an issue?

[00:21:19] Speaker 01:
Well, no.

[00:21:20] Speaker 04:
As far as the redaction and sealing?

[00:21:22] Speaker 01:
Just with respect to the medical information, they've been redacted and sealed.

[00:21:27] Speaker 01:
But these exhibits contain other information other than medical.

[00:21:33] Speaker 04:
Can you give me a hypothetical?

[00:21:34] Speaker 01:
Sure.

[00:21:35] Speaker 01:
There's a notice of controversy that GW originally filed, controverting the workers' compensation case.

[00:21:42] Speaker 04:
But that's settled.

[00:21:44] Speaker 04:
That's resolved.

[00:21:50] Speaker 01:
The workers' compensation case?

[00:21:53] Speaker 04:
She filed the claim and GW paid.

[00:21:55] Speaker 01:
Paid some benefits.

[00:21:57] Speaker 01:
And under the workers' compensation law,

[00:21:59] Speaker 01:
Her claim remains open, at least with respect to medical treatment for the rest of her life.

[00:22:04] Speaker 01:
So that claim isn't.

[00:22:07] Speaker 01:
But the exhibits I filed were filed to show that Ms.

[00:22:12] Speaker 01:
Abdelhadi filed a workers' compensation claim, accepted some benefits, and litigated through the workers' compensation process, because that was- All I'm getting at is you can do that with sealed documents.

[00:22:27] Speaker 04:
Is there any interest that you have that requires these be public?

[00:22:33] Speaker 01:
The interest George Washington has is, Ms.

[00:22:36] Speaker 01:
Abdelhadi claims that these exhibits were filed in bad faith.

[00:22:44] Speaker 01:
That's a very serious allegation.

[00:22:46] Speaker 01:
Judge McFadden found no elements of bad faith, but that remains in the public record.

[00:22:53] Speaker 01:
So to have the specter of exhibits being filed in bad faith without the public being able to see them.

[00:23:00] Speaker 04:
But counsel, I'm just trying to understand this.

[00:23:07] Speaker 04:
All right.

[00:23:08] Speaker 04:
Of course, the claim of bad faith is very serious.

[00:23:14] Speaker 04:
And GWU wants to be able to confront that.

[00:23:23] Speaker 04:
But I don't read the district court as saying that that would justify making those records public.

[00:23:33] Speaker 01:
No, I agree.

[00:23:34] Speaker 01:
But the district court relied heavily on the public access doctrine, which really is the basis for all of the ceiling versus non-ceiling.

[00:23:44] Speaker 01:
And the court recognizes, this court has recognized that it's a fundamental principle that the public has the right.

[00:23:52] Speaker 04:
No question about it.

[00:23:53] Speaker 04:
And this court doesn't like to seal or close arguments, much less issue opinions that aren't generally available.

[00:24:02] Speaker 04:
But there are circumstances where it's done.

[00:24:04] Speaker 04:
And I just, I'm having trouble understanding

[00:24:09] Speaker 04:
the argument here because the district court was not suggesting the way I'm reading his opinion that any of the plaintiff's medical records should be in the public domain and yet is clearly enabling GWU to defend against her claim.

[00:24:40] Speaker 04:
But I don't need the district court to say that because she's accused you of bad faith, you would get the right to put this out for public consumption.

[00:24:52] Speaker 01:
I guess I take a different view.

[00:24:56] Speaker 01:
We have the public access doctrine.

[00:24:57] Speaker 01:
And this court is held.

[00:25:01] Speaker 01:
The public should be able to see the information that the court had available to it in reaching its decisions.

[00:25:08] Speaker 04:
should be.

[00:25:09] Speaker 04:
And, you know, you know even better than I at multiple occasions when that doesn't happen because of the interests that people have in their personal medical records.

[00:25:23] Speaker 01:
And I think Your Honor's concern about medical records has been alleviated because all that's been redacted

[00:25:30] Speaker 01:
We're just arguing over other documents, these 16 exhibits, that no longer have medical information.

[00:25:39] Speaker 01:
We're just talking about does the body of these exhibits, which include a transcript from the workers' compensation proceeding, that didn't deal anything with medical records.

[00:25:49] Speaker 01:
It has correspondence between Ms.

[00:25:51] Speaker 01:
Abdelhadi and GW's counsel.

[00:25:55] Speaker 01:
It doesn't contain any medical information.

[00:26:00] Speaker 01:
So that went to the heart or that supported GW's reply on its dispositive motions.

[00:26:08] Speaker 01:
The public should have the ability to see that.

[00:26:11] Speaker 01:
Now, the fact that Ms.

[00:26:12] Speaker 01:
Abdelhadi doesn't want the public to see it, that's really not a fact, that's a factor, but it's not really strong enough to overcome the public access doctrine.

[00:26:24] Speaker 01:
And it goes back to the heart of the question, why do we care?

[00:26:27] Speaker 01:
Why does George Washington care?

[00:26:30] Speaker 01:
Your honor, when Ms.

[00:26:31] Speaker 01:
Abdelhadi filed a 67-page complaint with 10 counts, including RICO, violation of her civil rights, fraud, abuse of process, those are not the types of claims that GW typically sees.

[00:26:47] Speaker 01:
That shows up in the internet.

[00:26:49] Speaker 01:
It shows up on different listservs filed by plaintiffs.

[00:26:53] Speaker 01:
And the headlines are GW sued for racketeering.

[00:26:57] Speaker 01:
And that's out in the public space.

[00:27:00] Speaker 01:
Then we have the plaintiff filing within her amended complaint.

[00:27:05] Speaker 01:
She goes into great detail about our workers' compensation case.

[00:27:09] Speaker 01:
She states that she filed it.

[00:27:11] Speaker 01:
She states that George Washington filed a notice of controversy.

[00:27:15] Speaker 01:
She said GW scheduled independent medical evaluations.

[00:27:19] Speaker 01:
GW had a nurse practitioner or a nurse manager assigned to it.

[00:27:22] Speaker 01:
GW wrongfully paid or didn't pay benefits.

[00:27:26] Speaker 01:
They didn't pay our wage stacking benefits.

[00:27:30] Speaker 01:
explicit detail about our workers' compensation case.

[00:27:34] Speaker 01:
The exhibits that we filed simply correlate to those events.

[00:27:40] Speaker 04:
So what do you understand the judge's current order to me when he says, I'm not going to go through all these documents, the party should meet and confer?

[00:27:49] Speaker 01:
Yeah, I think what the judge says, where there's medical information, the party should meet and confer.

[00:27:55] Speaker 01:
And again, disagree with Mrs. Abdelhadi.

[00:27:58] Speaker 01:
He explicitly stated meet and confer.

[00:28:01] Speaker 01:
When this order came in, I took first stab at preparing redactions, forwarded them to Ms.

[00:28:07] Speaker 01:
Abdelhadi.

[00:28:08] Speaker 01:
She returned comments.

[00:28:10] Speaker 01:
And ultimately, we filed the redacted comments.

[00:28:14] Speaker 01:
Medical stuff was taken care of.

[00:28:16] Speaker 01:
Then I read his order saying that the other exhibits, these 16 exhibits, since they no longer contain medical information,

[00:28:27] Speaker 01:
They fall within the public access doctrine because they were submitted to persuade the court and the court issued its decision, although it may not have explicitly relied on it.

[00:28:39] Speaker 01:
It's public access.

[00:28:41] Speaker 01:
The public should have access to these documents.

[00:28:49] Speaker 01:
I think my time is up unless there's other questions.

[00:28:52] Speaker 01:
Thank you.

[00:28:56] Speaker 04:
But why don't you take a minute.

[00:29:06] Speaker 03:
Thank you, your honors.

[00:29:08] Speaker 03:
First, the university has not articulated a reason why these need to be public in terms of the bad faith issue that came up after it filed these documents.

[00:29:16] Speaker 03:
It was not motivation for it to file in terms of refuting any bad faith issue that was in the record.

[00:29:25] Speaker 03:
So there's no reason that GW has articulated still.

[00:29:29] Speaker 03:
I have an interest in the nonpublic status of these documents.

[00:29:34] Speaker 03:
It's provided under the district law, the WC act.

[00:29:39] Speaker 03:
These are sealed documents.

[00:29:40] Speaker 03:
And it matters how these documents made their way into this record on the public docket.

[00:29:46] Speaker 03:
And that's what this court has said in the in race sealed case, FEC, in the League of Women Voters cases, et cetera.

[00:29:53] Speaker 03:
The district court was not

[00:29:55] Speaker 03:
authorized to consider these documents under Rule 12B6 and it did so and it was not performing a judicial function.

[00:30:03] Speaker 03:
They are not judicial records.

[00:30:05] Speaker 03:
GW says the bad faith claim is serious.

[00:30:07] Speaker 03:
Indeed it is.

[00:30:08] Speaker 03:
What's also serious is GW's claim in its brief in this case in the district court that I, an attorney, filed a sham affidavit in opposition to summary judgment and that I denied filing the WC claim.

[00:30:21] Speaker 03:
None of those things are true and I would urge the court to carefully review the record.

[00:30:25] Speaker 03:
So we have the bad, safe, and improper purpose of avoiding rule 12D plus the additional bad faith and improper purpose of the sham affidavit fiction that GW still cannot cite.

[00:30:38] Speaker 03:
This is now the third proceeding.

[00:30:40] Speaker 03:
It's an issue.

[00:30:41] Speaker 03:
That's also serious.

[00:30:43] Speaker 03:
So, you know, seriousness goes both ways here.

[00:30:46] Speaker 03:
The medical information, you were just told there is no medical information.

[00:30:52] Speaker 03:
That's factually incorrect.

[00:30:56] Speaker 03:
The joint appendix sealed 20 is the claim form that references diagnosis.

[00:31:02] Speaker 03:
And it also references provider names.

[00:31:05] Speaker 03:
That remains unredacted on the public docket.

[00:31:08] Speaker 03:
And 71 of the sealed supplement, that's the 12b6 reply, screenshots of DOES documents that are an issue also containing diagnosis.

[00:31:18] Speaker 03:
That is not public.

[00:31:20] Speaker 03:
It is not in the redacted amended complaint.

[00:31:22] Speaker 03:
This court should reverse.

[00:31:23] Speaker 03:
And again, I urge the court to think about how these documents made their way into the public docket.

[00:31:29] Speaker 03:
That matters.

[00:31:30] Speaker 03:
Thank you very much.