Several months after unsealing the docket sheet in a 1998 "John Doe" criminal case, Eastern District Judge I. Leo Glasser (See Profile) has ordered the unsealing of several of the underlying documents related to a government cooperator. Last summer, Glasser unsealed the docket sheet, which is a listing and brief description of documents filed with the court, in a matter concerning Felix Sater, finding that it was an open secret that Sater was the government-protected "John Doe" of 1998.
Sater, who was convicted in connection with a stock scam but was shielded as a result of a cooperation agreement, was inadvertently identified by the government and intentionally identified by a Long Island attorney. The lawyer, Frederick Oberlander, attached sealed documents in the Sater case to a civil racketeering action. Oberlander and his attorney, Richard Lerner, are targets of both criminal and civil contempt investigations. For the past several months, Glasser has held closed-door meetings with federal prosecutors to determine which of the Sater documents should be made public (NYLJ, Oct. 10, 2012).
