NINTH CIRCUIT AFFIRMS DENIAL OF REQUEST FOR ANONYMITY IN CHALLENGE TO HAWAIIAN SCHOOL'S ALLEGEDLY DISCRIMINATORY ADMISSIONS POLICY
On March 2, 2010, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a Hawaiian district court decision denying the request of applicants to the Kamehameha Schools to proceed anonymously in a lawsuit challenging the school’s admissions policy, and further affirmed the district court’s dismissal of their claims for failure to identify themselves.
The plaintiffs were prospective students, applicants to the Kamehameha Schools, the largest independent school system in the United States, comprised of nearly 7,000 students. Princess Bernice Pauahi, the last descendant of the Hawaiian monarchy, established the school system in 1884, and since that time the school has stood as a bastion of Hawaiian culture. The Kamehameha Schools’ admissions policy explicitly provides that all qualified applicants with Hawaiian blood must be admitted to the school before any non-native Hawaiian applicants.
When plaintiffs filed suit against Kamehameha Schools claiming the admissions policy constitutes unlawful discrimination, they requested permission to proceed anonymously. Plaintiffs based their request for anonymity on threats made against them on the internet, past threats of violence against others in similar lawsuits, and specific incidences of native Hawaiians committing violent crimes with racial overtones against non-natives. The district court denied plaintiffs’ request for anonymity, and then dismissed the case after plaintiffs failed to disclose their identities.
The Ninth Circuit affirmed, holding that that district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the request for anonymity and dismissing the case. In reaching its conclusion, the appellate court considered the five factors that the district court balanced in determining whether to allow plaintiffs to proceed anonymously over Kamehameha’s objection: (1) the severity of the threatened harm; (2) the reasonableness of plaintiffs’ fears; (3) plaintiffs’ vulnerability to such retaliation; (4) prejudice to Kamehameha; and (5) the public interest.
According to the Ninth Circuit, the district court did not abuse its discretion in finding plaintiffs’ fear of harm was unreasonable, in part because “many times people say things anonymously on the internet that they would never say in another context and have no intention of carrying out.” In light of the strong general presumption that parties should conduct litigation in their own names, based in part on the public’s right to open courts, the district court did not abuse its discretion in finding that the public interest outweighed plaintiffs’ interest in proceeding anonymously.
However, it should be noted that the Ninth Circuit indicated that had the district court reached the opposite result, the Ninth Circuit would likely have affirmed that opposite result as well, finding no abuse of discretion: “As an appellate court, we are constrained by the applicable standard of review. Had the district court found that anonymity was appropriate, we likely would have concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion.”
