Opinion ID: 2065953
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Motion to Proceed Pseudonymously

Text: The state disputes whether the appeals of the plaintiffs other than Pelland regarding this issue are properly before us because no final judgment was entered dismissing those plaintiffs from the case. Nevertheless, we will address the merits of their arguments. Even though there is no direct authority in this state with respect to the proper standard of review of a hearing justice's decision denying a plaintiff the right to proceed using a pseudonym, we believe there is persuasive authority in decisions of federal courts holding that such a decision is within the sound discretion of the hearing justice that will be disturbed only if the hearing justice has abused his discretion. See Lindsey v. Dayton-Hudson Corp., 592 F.2d 1118, 1125 (10th Cir.1979) (We believe that the proper standard of review [of a decision on whether to allow a party to use a pseudonym] upon appeal is whether the trial court abused its discretion   .). The plaintiffs press the argument that the balance of interests militates in favor of allowing them to use pseudonyms because they have moved on with their lives, and revealing their identities as sex offenders at this time could have a deleterious effect on the families they have established and the employment they have secured. Further, they express concerns about reprisals in their jobs and harassment in their communities. Correctly, they point out that Burkland articulates a test to be employed when a court considers whether a litigant should be permitted to proceed using a pseudonym. In Burkland, 808 A.2d at 1092 n. 1, the plaintiff originally filed a suit using his legal name, only to later ask to use a pseudonym and to have his name redacted from previous court filings. The defendant appealed to this Court after the trial justice allowed the plaintiff to use a pseudonym and ordered the plaintiff's true name redacted from the documents in the record. Id. When we decided Burkland, we relied on persuasive authority from the federal courts as well as a scholarly article, and we determined that the proper mechanism to decide such a motion was to employ a balancing test that weighs the rights and interests of each litigating party and the interests of the public. Id. at 1097 (quoting Joan Steinman, Public Trial, Pseudonymous Parties: When Should Litigants be Permitted to Keep Their Identities Confidential?, 37 Hastings L.J. 1, 36 (1985)). We also set forth the factors that should be considered in that balancing test, including: (1) the extent to which the identity has been kept confidential; (2) the reasons the litigant fears public disclosure; (3) the public interest in concealing the litigant's identity; (4) circumstances that create an atypically weak interest in public disclosure; and (5) the legitimacy of the motives both of the litigant seeking pseudonymity and the party seeking to force disclosure. Id. at 1096-97 n. 6. Because the plaintiff in Burkland had voluntarily spread his true name all over the public record for nine months while his lawsuit was pending and before he sought the right to proceed using a pseudonym, we held that he had negated any interest he may have had in concealing his identity, and, therefore, it was error for the trial justice to grant his motion. Id. at 1097. Insofar as the current appeal relates to Pelland, the circumstances are nearly identical. After the hearing justice denied his motion to proceed pseudonymously and ordered that Pelland's claim be dismissed unless he proceeded using his real name, Pelland voluntarily chose to go forward rather than seek review of the hearing justice's ruling. As the hearing justice pointed out, Pelland's name was open on the public record for nearly a year before he sought any review of the decision to deny him the use of a pseudonym. Cf. Burkland, 808 A.2d at 1095 (plaintiff should not have been allowed to unring the bell that he had been tolling for approximately nine months after he began this lawsuit in his own name). Therefore, we hold that the hearing justice did not abuse his discretion when he denied Pelland's motion to reconsider the question of whether he could proceed using a pseudonym. The appeals of the remaining two plaintiffs, however, hinge on the propriety of the hearing justice's decision in the first instance, when he denied the motion to proceed under a pseudonym and ordered that the complaints be dismissed unless the plaintiffs filed affidavits signifying their willingness to go forward using their real names. During the hearing justice's explication of this decision, rendered nearly eleven months before Burkland was issued, he cited some of the very same cases as well as the very same law review article that we cited in Burkland when we articulated the standard. See Burkland, 808 A.2d at 1096. Further, he explained the value of public disclosure in this case, the relative ineffectiveness of concealing the plaintiffs' true identities because of the various laws concerning the identification of sex offenders, and generally weighed the privacy interest of the plaintiffs against the public interest in disclosure. Thus, even without the benefit of the Burkland opinion, the hearing justice in this case undertook the very balancing test for which that case later called, [7] and he came to the conclusion that plaintiffs should not be allowed to proceed using pseudonyms. Our review of the record leads us to conclude that this decision was not an abuse of discretion, and therefore we hold that the motion was properly denied.