On Monday, a Brooklyn federal judge, U.S. District Judge Leo Glasser, unsealed a criminal docket that was under seal for more than a decade – an effort made futile by various leaks over the year by the government and media. The judge observed that both prosecutors and the press have already identified the “John Doe” in the criminal case on several occasions, and continuing to keep his identity under seal was meaningless.
The “John Doe” in the case has been identified as one Felix Sater.
In a 1998 criminal case against Slater, he pleaded guilty to one count of racketeering in connection with a $40 million stock-fraud scheme and cooperated with the government according to terms of the plea agreement. In trying to protect Sater the case and the docket were sealed.
However, in 2010, an attorney initially identified as Richard Roe, but since then identified as one Frederick Oberlander, filed a civil racketeering case in which Sater was identified, and the complaint included several sealed documents from the criminal case. Though the civil case was sealed after a few days, the damage had already been done.
While the government and lawyers on behalf of Sater argued that the case needed to be kept under wraps, the judge disagreed. Judge Glasser noted that the details of the case have been made public several times over the years.
The U.S. Attorney's Office let Sater's name and conviction slip in a press release in 2000, that was reprinted in the Congressional Record. In July, the Miami Herald ran a story identifying Sater as John Doe in the case. Earlier this year, inadvertently, the docket sheet was unsealed for several days due to an apparent clerical error.
Since the continuance of this comedy of errors made further sealing of the case and document pointless, the judge unsealed it.
The case is In re: Applications to Unseal 98-cr-1101, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, No. 12-150.
