Opinion
No. 62113
03-31-2014
RALPH R. KAMINSKI, IN HIS CAPACITY AS AN INDIVIDUAL, AS PERSONAL REPRESENTATIVE OF THE ESTATE OF DORIS KAMINSKI, DECEASED; AND AS TRUSTEE OF THE CCP 1989 NEVADA TRUST, Appellants, v. BETTY KAMINSKI AN INDIVIDUAL; AND CHARLES KAMINSKI, AN INDIVIDUAL, Respondents.
An unpublished order shall not be regarded as precedent and shall not be cited as legal authority. SCR 123.
ORDER OF AFFIRMANCE
This is an appeal from a district court order dismissing the parties' claims and counterclaims with prejudice and disapproving their stipulation to seal records. Ninth Judicial District Court, Douglas County: David R. Gamble, Judge.
Following protracted litigation appellant Ralph Kaminski and respondents Betty and Charles Kaminski entered into a settlement agreement by which they agreed to abandon their claims and counterclaims against each ether and seal all documents . . . relevant to or referencing any foreign financial institution" from the district court record. The parties filed a stipulation to dismiss the claims with prejudice and to seal the records, with a proposed order attached thereto. The district court approved the stipulation to dismiss and granted voluntary dismissal with prejudice, but disapproved the stipulation to seal.
The parties raise interesting arguments implicating statutory construction and contract law. These arguments are irrelevant, however: the parties did not ask the district court to enforce a settlement agreement, only to (1) enter an order granting voluntary dismissal, which it did; and (2) approve a stipulation to seal records, which it did not. Appellant does not request that this court reverse the order of dismissal. And the stipulation to seal was fatally deficient because it failed to precisely specify the documents to be sealed and did not adequately identify the grounds for doing so. See Policy for Handling Filed, Lodged, and Presumptively Confidential Documents Rule 2(1) (describing the clerk's duties as purely ministerial); SRCR 3(4) (listing the various grounds justifying the sealing of records); SRCR 3(7)(a) (tasking the clerk with filing on seal the "specified court records"). Thus, the district court did not abuse its discretion by disapproving it. Marcuse v. Del Webb Communities, Inc., 123 Nev. 278, 286 & n.15, 163 P.3d 462, 467 & n.15 (2007).
Appellant argues that Part VII of the Supreme Court Rules (the Nevada Rules for Sealing and Redacting Court Records) does not apply. But it applies "to all court records in civil actions" with limited exceptions that are not relevant here. SRCR 1(4).
We therefore ORDER the judgment of the district court AFFIRMED.
______________________, J.
Pickering
______________________, J.
Parraguirre
______________________, J.
Saitta
cc: Ninth Judicial District Court Dept. 1
Law Offices of Ryan J. Earl
Nancy Rey Jackson
Douglas County Clerk