Detroit Bulk Storage, Inc. v. Travelers Property Casualty Company of America

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN
SOUTHERN DIVISION
DETROIT BULK STORAGE, INC.,
Plaintiff, Case No. 23-cv-10038
Hon. Matthew F. Leitman
v.
TRAVELERS PROPERTY CASUALTY
COMPANY OF AMERICA,
Defendant.
_________________________________/
AMENDED ORDER DENYING DEFENDANT’S
MOTION TO SEAL (ECF No. 35) WITHOUT PREJUDICE1
On October 30, 2025, Defendant Travelers Property Casualty Company of
America (“Travelers”) filed a motion to seal two documents that it intends to rely
upon in support of its forthcoming motion for summary judgment: (1) a “Revere
Dock Cost Summary” dated June 8, 2021 (ECF No. 35-3); and (2) a March 14, 2025,
expert report (and exhibits) authored by Susan J. Klos (ECF No. 35-4). Both
documents were prepared in related state-court litigation. The documents were
designated as confidential pursuant to a protective order in the state-court action.
For the reasons explained below, the motion is DENIED WITHOUT
PREJUDICE.
1 This Amended Order corrects the misidentification of the parties in the Court’s
original Order denying the motion to seal. (See Order, ECF No. 38.)
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As the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has explained,
there is a long-standing “strong presumption in favor of openness as to court
records.” Shane Grp., Inc. v. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Mich., 825 F.3d 305 (6th Cir.
2016) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Thus, when a party moves
to seal court records, it bears a “heavy” burden to “overcom[e] that
presumption.” Id. To meet that burden, the party moving to seal “must show three
things: (1) a compelling interest in sealing the records; (2) that the interest in sealing
outweighs the public’s interest in accessing the records; and (3) that the request is
narrowly tailored.” Kondash v. Kia Motors America, Inc., 767 F. App’x 635, 637
(6th Cir. 2019). In order to show that a party’s compelling reason for sealing
outweighs the public’s interest in access, and that the proposal for sealing is narrowly
tailored, a party must “analyze in detail, document by document, the propriety of
secrecy, providing reasons and legal citations.” Shane Grp., 825 F.3d at 305-06.
The Court has reviewed the two documents that Travelers requests to seal,
and the Court is not yet persuaded that there is a compelling interest in sealing the
documents under Shane Group. The documents do not appear to contain
competitive or proprietary business information. Instead, the documents primarily
relate to costs incurred to repair the dock collapse. Moreover, the sealing request is
not narrowly tailored. Travelers seeks to redact the documents in their entirety, but
it appears that the documents could be redacted in part to shield the proprietary
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business information, if any, contained in the documents. For all of these reasons,
the Court DENIES Travelers’ motion to seal WITHOUT PREJUDICE.
The Court recognizes that the state-court protective order poses significant
challenges to Travelers’ use in this action of the two documents identified in the
motion to seal. Accordingly, the Court will set a status conference with the parties
to discuss possible resolutions to those challenges.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
s/Matthew F. Leitman
MATTHEW F. LEITMAN
Dated: November 3, 2025 UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
I hereby certify that a copy of the foregoing document was served upon the
parties and/or counsel of record on November 3, 2025, by electronic means and/or
ordinary mail.
s/Tara Villereal
Case Manager
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