Smart v. NCAA

• Court: District Court, E.D. California
• Decided: March 28, 2025
• Docket: 2:22-cv-02125
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 9 EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 10 ----oo0oo---- 11 12 TAYLOR SMART AND MICHAEL HACKER, No. 2:22-cv-02125 WBS CSK Individually and on Behalf of 13 All Those Similarly Situated, 14 Plaintiffs, ORDER RE: REQUEST TO SEAL 15 v. 16 NATIONAL COLLEGIATE ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION, an unincorporated 17 association, 18 Defendant. 19 20 ----oo0oo---- 21 Plaintiffs have filed a request to seal in connection 22 with their pending motion for preliminary approval of a class 23 action settlement, seeking to redact the settlement agreement’s 24 threshold percentage of opt-outs needed to trigger the 25 agreement’s termination clause. (Docket No. 72.) 26 A party seeking to seal a judicial record bears the 27 burden of overcoming a strong presumption in favor of public 28 access. See Kamakana v. City & County of Honolulu, 447 F.3d 1 1172, 1178 (9th Cir. 2006). The party must “articulate 2 compelling reasons supported by specific factual findings that 3 outweigh the general history of access and the public policies 4 favoring disclosure, such as the public interest in understanding 5 the judicial process.” Id. at 1178-79 (citation omitted). In 6 ruling on a motion to seal, the court must balance the competing 7 interests of the public and the party seeking to keep records 8 secret. See id. at 1179. 9 As other courts have explained, a settlement 10 agreement’s opt-out threshold for termination is likely “not 11 important to any individual class members’ decision to either 12 remain in or opt out of the class,” while public revelation of 13 that number raises a “potential for abuse” by so-called 14 “professional objectors” (i.e., “attorneys for class members who 15 extort additional payments from the parties in exchange for not 16 delaying or tanking the whole settlement”). See Friedman v. 17 Guthy-Renker, LLC, No. 2:14-cv-06009 ODW AGR 2016 WL 5402170, at 18 *2 (C.D. Cal. Sept. 26, 2016); see also, e.g., In re Lyft Inc. 19 Sec. Litig., No. 19-CV-02690 HSG, 2023 WL 2960006, at *2 (N.D. 20 Cal. Mar. 16, 2023); In re Yahoo! Inc. Sec. Litig., No. 17-cv- 21 00373-LHK, 2018 WL 11349976, at *2 (N.D. Cal. May 9, 2018); 22 Thomas v. Magnachip Semiconductor Corp., No. 14-cv-01160 JST, 23 2016 WL 3879193, at *7 (N.D. Cal. July 18, 2016). There are 24 therefore compelling reasons to grant plaintiffs’ request. 25 IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that plaintiffs’ request to 26 seal (Docket No. 72) be, and the same hereby is, GRANTED. The 27 redacted version of the document has already been filed on the 28 publicly available docket. (See Docket No. 73-1 at 24-45.) ee nn ene nen ee nn nnn nen ne nen nnn nn ED OE

1 Defendants shall file the unredacted version of the settlement 2 agreement under seal within five days. 3 Dated: March 27, 2025 ' ~ ak. a bean, (hi. ‘ WILLIAM B. SHUBB 5 UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28