| Stealth Sealing of Secret
Plea of Migdol Shows Court Transparency
Loophole Calling for Closure
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon Maxwell
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BBC-Guardian
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SDNY COURTHOUSE,
May 11 – Federal
prosecutors can supposedly not
ask to have a courtroom sealed
in a criminal case without
getting approval from Main
Justice in Washington.
But there are
loopholes that get exploited.
And currently it is nearly
impossible to close the
loopholes.
Take for example
the stealth guilty plea on no
notice of Harlem developer
Gerald Migdol in mid-April
2022.
It happened in
the Magistrates Court of the
U.S. District Court for the
Southern District of New York,
where Migdol will now
presumably be deployed or
brandished as a cooperator
against former NYS Lt Gov
Brian Benjamin.
Migdol's
white shoe lawyer asked the
Magistrate Judge to seal the
courtroom. But she confirmed
with the Assistant US Attorney
that they could only make the
request after speaking with
Washington.
Still, she said,
it seemed there was no one
else in the courtroom, and no
one else would know since the
AUSA would request and get the
sealing of the transcript and
delayed docketing of the
proceeding.
Here's the
second and most pernicious
loophole. It is generally
impossible for the Press and
public to even try to unseal a
transcript or docket entry if
they don't even know it
exists. And that is what this
process allows
for.
In this case,
Inner City Press exclusively
tweeted and then reported
on April 15 that Migdol had
been in the Mag Court and had
pleaded guilty, with
cooperation dangled. Others
did not follow up, at least
not in print, because it could
not be confirmed.
And when
weeks later the documents were
grandly
unsealed, ironically including
the "this is not closed" double-talk,
the proceeding was dubiously
describes as having been
closed.
No mention of the
DOJ two-step, nor of the
previous story. And so the
loophole is never fixed, and
grows larger. We'll have more
on this.
***
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