Aaron Worthing's Motion to Place Brett Kimberlin's Motion to Unseal Under Seal (OCR)

8/2/2019 Aaron Worthing's Motion to Place Brett Kimberlin's Motion to Unseal Under Seal (OCR)

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MARYLAND:IN THE CmCUIT COURT FORMONTGOMERY COUNTY

BRETT KIMBERLIN,

Plaintiffv.

SETH ALLEN,Defendant

Case No. 339254V

EMERGENCYMOTION TO PLACE PLAINTIFF'S "MOTION TO UNSEAL" UNDERSEAL

Now COMES, John Doe, an anonymous blogger who writes under the names "AaronWorthing," and "A.W." and files this motion to place the Plaintiffs "Motion to Unseal PleadingsRelated to [Name Redacted] a.k.a. Aaron Worthing" under seal. From here on in, I will refer tomyself in the third person as "Mr. Worthing." Mr. Worthing files this emergency motion underthis pseudonym in order to maintain the very anonymity he is asking this court to preserve. I

Mr. Worthing will file his full response to the Plaintiff s motion in due time, butrespectfully requests immediate consideration of this motion.

I As a preliminary matter, this court has granted Mr. Worthing's motion to file anonymously orto file under seal. In it, Mr. Worthing requested that the court grantMr. Worthing the right to fileanonymously, or to file one copy under seal under his real name, and then file a public copy ofthe document with his real name omitted. Mr. Worthing interprets the judge's ruling as givinghim the option pursuing either option. However, if this court prefers that Mr. Worthing file acopy under seal under his real name, he will happily do so.


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FACTS

1. Mr. Worthing is an attorney in good standing in two foreign (U.S.) jurisdictions.Mr. Worthing is not admitted into practice inMaryland.

2. He has blogged2 at Patterico's Pontifications, Big Government, Big Journalism,Allergic to Bull and Everyone Draw Mohammed. Those blogs can be found athttp://patterico.corn!, http://biggovernment.com!, http://bigjournalism.com!,http://allergic2bull.blogspot.com!,http://everyonedrawmohammed.blogspot.com! respectively.

3. At all times Mr. Worthing has maintained his anonymity by the use of thepseudonyms "A.W." and "AaronWorthing."

4. Mr. Worthing's blogging activities have, by the Plaintiff's own admission"inflame[d] [the] hostilities of Muslim hardliners." See Plaintiffs "Motion To CompelGoogle.com" 4 (filed on or about December 19,2011).

5. On Friday, January 6, 2012, the Plaintiff filed a Motion to Withdraw as MootPlaintiff's Motion to Compel and Subpoenas to Comcast and Google Seeking Identity of AaronWorthing."

6. The basis of this motion was that he had obtained Mr. Worthing's identity byother means.

2 For the benefit of the court each "blog," short for weblog, is composed of a series of postswhich discuss various topics, sharing facts, opinion and analysis. Then, with all of the blogsrelevant to this motion, the post allows a broad swath of the public to compose and attach"comments" to each post, allowing for praise, criticism and even off-topic remarks. Regularcornmenters often even communicate, in public, in this fashion. For more discussion of howsuch features of the internet work, see Independent Newspapers v. Brodie, 966 A.2d 432 (2009),especially starting at 437.

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7. The Plaintiffonly had to reveal the bare fact he had obtained Mr. Worthing's trueidentity in the context of the motion. It was not even necessary to mention Mr. Worthing'sname.

8. Instead, and with an manifestly improper purpose in violation ofMaryland Rule 1-311, he put the following information in his Motion to Withdraw:

a. Mr. Worthing's true name.b. His home address.c. His birth date.d. Where he went to high school.e. Whether he graduated from that high school.f Where and when he went to undergraduate school and the degree obtained.g. Details of a lawsuit that was supposed to be under seal.h. Where and when he went to law school.1. His current employer and that employer's address.

9. On the same day, he emailed the FBI, the Fairfax County Police, the PrinceWilliam County Police, informing them that he had filed this document with the court, revealingMr. Worthing's identity and addresses to the world, specifically stating to them that he wasafraid that the very same "Muslim Hardliners" would seek to harm Mr. Worthing, or any personwho happened to be near him, due to his filing.

10. Therefore he confessed that he had intentionally exposed Mr. Worthing to thedanger of terrorist attack.

11. The following Monday, January 9, 2012, Mr. Worthing made an emergencymotion to this court asking for the Plaintiff s plainly improper motion to be placed under seal.

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That motion was immediately granted as this court found that Mr. Kimberlin had no validpurpose for putting that personal information in the document.

12. Now, once again, Mr. Kimberlin is seeking to use this court to expose Mr.Worthing's true identity to the world, this time by putting Mr. Worthing true name in the Motionto Unseal itself, so that any person searching the Maryland Judiciary Case Search onlinedatabase would be able to determineMr. Worthing's identity.

13. Once again, this revelation is gratuitous and manifests an improper purpose inviolation ofMaryland Rule 1-311.

14. The Plaintiffs plain purpose is to put out this information into the public sphereso that others can disseminate this information with the "fig leaf' of claiming that they are justreporting on the contents of court papers.

15. This is because i f they revealed Mr. Worthing true name on their own, withoutthat "fig leaf," their conduct would likely run afoul ofVA CODE 18.2-46.5 (C) which makes it aClass 4 felony if any person "solicits, invites, recruits, encourages, or otherwise causes orattempts to cause another to participate in an act or acts of terrorism." (Emphasis added).

WHEREFORE the Mr. Worthing requests that the court (1) immediately seal thePlaintiffs entire Motion to Unseal and instruct the appropriate authorities to ensure that the Mr.Worthing's true name be redacted from any entry in the Maryland Judiciary Case Searchdatabase, (2) file a protective order against Mr. Kimberlin prohibiting him from filing anymotion revealingMr. Worthing's true name, (3) sanctionMr. Kimberlin for his plainly improperconduct under Maryland Rule 1-311, and (4) any other reliefthat this court considers to be justand equitable.

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Dated: January 18,2012

Respectfully submitted,

/s/ Aaron [email protected]@gmail.com

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Documents

Aaron Worthing's Motion to Place Brett Kimberlin's Motion to Unseal Under Seal (OCR)