A Protective Order That Protected Nothing

If a judge signed a protective order to guard your most sensitive life details from disclosure to the general public in a civil lawsuit, what would you expect?

Would you expect the judge to enforce it?

Would you expect a stern warning to anyone responsible for a disclosure?

Would you expect the court to threaten sanctions when confidential information is dumped into the public record?

Would you expect the judge to treat medical records with special caution?

I expected all of those things as a litigant—and received none of them.

Confidentiality: The Broken Promise

In one of the initial hearings before Judge Kevin M. Miller, he affirmed—at least orally—that confidentiality was appropriate in our case: “I think there should be — the confidentiality [designation] is… appropriate.” And, “…as soon as that order — [has] been put in the file, I’ll sign it right away.”

I believed him. I believed his word.

But what came next felt like something else entirely: a protective order signed on paper—and then treated as optional in practice. The promise wasn’t that the court would sign an order. The promise was that it would mean something when it was violated.

It didn’t.

Our History: Once Quiet Lives—Before They Were Shattered

Craig and I were private people. And for good reason.

I had a tumultuous childhood marked by physical, verbal, and emotional abuse. I left home at 16 to escape it. My father once confronted me at my workplace looking for my mother after she left him. It was a life-changing event—one that affected me in profound ways.

When I married Craig, we made a decision to lay low. Relatives would call to warn us when my father would be present at a family gathering. Knowing my history—and his hatred for me—we avoided those gatherings like the plague.

When my mother left my father for the second and final time, she told me not to be present for the move. If he came home and found me there, she said, I could be in grave danger.

One of my brothers reinforced it with the same warning: “Do not come!”

Years passed, but the cauldron never cooled. My father still blamed me for his divorce from my mother, and I was not in a place to endure any more confrontations—or the threat of them.

That’s why, when Craig’s relatives decided to involve my father in their personal vendetta against him, I began having severe panic attacks. Four cease-and-desist letters weren’t enough to stop them. They wouldn’t be denied. A lawsuit appeared to be our only option.

As we entered litigation, I wondered if I could hold on to any anonymity—any privacy at all.

Almost no one knew my history. I was embarrassed to be an abuse victim. Embarrassed about being hospitalized as an inpatient at 16 due to depression. Embarrassed because abuse victims are “supposed” to be overcomers—and I didn’t feel like one at that time.

So I hoped the protective order would at least protect the most sensitive parts of my life.

That hope was misplaced.

The First Stipulated Protective Order—and the First Violation

Early in the litigation, we filed for an AEO (“attorney’s eyes only”) protective order. Defendants wanted all medical records covering over 50 years of my life. They did not need records about pregnancy or unrelated medical conditions.

Judge Miller denied the AEO designation, claiming it would “deprive Defendants of the ability to see documents relevant to the case.”

We then agreed to a standard stipulated protective order with confidentiality designations. Judge Miller signed it on July 22, 2021.

The first violation happened just two months later. Defendants described the contents of a confidential photograph—a handgun we had purchased to protect ourselves from my father—in a public filing. In a concurrently filed affidavit, defense counsel openly acknowledged the information came from a confidential document.

Judge Miller said nothing. Not at the hearing. Not in the order. Nothing.

The Second Stipulated Protective Order—and the Violations Multiply

Defendants claimed the first protective order was too restrictive and demanded a new one—with tweaks. We agreed. Judge Miller signed the second order on January 24, 2022.

Before long, violations became more frequent—and more blatant.

• April 11, 2022: Defendants filed a public memorandum recounting abuse-related deposition testimony, even though my deposition was designated confidential in its entirety. We alerted Judge Miller in our April 18, 2022 opposition memorandum. No action.
• October 17, 2022: Defense counsel filed an affidavit showing Defendants had uploaded a confidential home-security video to a public website based in Germany called Metadata2Go. We put this outrageous violation directly in front of Judge Miller in our October 24, 2022 opposition memorandum. Again: no action. Not referenced at hearing, not mentioned in the order. The court’s silence was becoming deafening—and the Defendants treated it like permission.
• January 27, 2023: Defendants released 74 pages of my private medical records without confidentiality designations. We repeatedly demanded they be corrected. Defense counsel repeatedly claimed they “will be marked” or “are marked” confidential—but for weeks, nothing changed. It wasn’t until we threatened a sanctions motion that the documents were marked—within minutes.
• February 15, 2023: Defense counsel filed their summary judgment motion. Their memorandum included confidential deposition testimony from two parties and multiple witnesses. We asked them to refile it as confidential. We were ignored.

Our Attorney Asked the Court for Help—On the Record

At the summary judgment hearing on March 15, 2023, our attorney pleaded for the court to address what was happening:

A protective order is not a decorative piece of paper. It’s supposed to mean something. People rely on it. And this was not the first time.

Judge Miller responded on the record that he would “come back” to it and told counsel: “Don’t let me forget this.”

The hearing ended. No one came back to it.

We Put It in Writing—And the Court Still Stayed Silent

So we sent a detailed letter to Judge Miller on March 21, 2023, including:

• a table full of violations in the summary judgment filings (and additional citations),
• a reminder about the gun being described publicly,
• new information about the home-security video uploaded to a foreign website,
• new information about the 74 pages of medical records released without confidentiality,
• and case law on the seriousness of these violations.

We told him plainly: if the court doesn’t address this, it will continue.

The result?

Judge Miller ignored the letter, dismissed our case at summary judgment, and refused to address the violations—calling all remaining issues, including protective order violations, “moot.”

“Moot” for the Court—A License for the Defendants

Were the violations really “moot”? Or did the Defendants hear that word as: keep going?

One Defendant sent 25 pages of my personal information to my childhood abuser—the very reason we filed the lawsuit in the first place. At what point does a judge decide that kind of privacy violation should be stopped?

Apparently, not even then.

• July 19, 2023: Defense counsel submitted taxation documents showing confidential home-security videos were provided to a third-party transcription firm. No written confidentiality assurance was provided to our attorneys.
• July 19, 2023: Additional taxation documents showed my medical records and deposition testimony were given to a third-party evaluation firm. Again, no written confidentiality assurance.

We called both issues out in our July 20, 2023 opposition memorandum.

• September 1, 2023: Defense counsel filed motion papers containing more confidential information—deposition quotes and quotes from private home-security videos. At least seven violations in that document alone.

The court’s October 13, 2023 order said nothing.

Silence again.

This Should Alarm Every Minnesota Citizen

Judge Miller signed both protective orders. The evidence that the court did not respond—did not appear to care—about repeated violations is alarming. And it should be alarming to anyone in Minnesota who has ever needed privacy in court.

Alarming for abuse victims—forced to relive exposure as their most sensitive testimony is made public.

Alarming for families—who now know that videos from inside their homes can be uploaded globally.

Alarming for gun owners—who learn firearm ownership details can be exposed without consent.

Alarming for medical patients—who discover private records can be released without confidentiality designations, with no consequence.

The Unthinkable Violation: A Judge Publicly Discloses a Medical Diagnosis

The most outrageous violation did not come from Defendants or defense counsel.

It came from Judge Miller himself.

On October 17, 2022, Defendants filed a motion to compel, trying to pierce our spousal privilege and demanding even more access to my medical records. Their memorandum was filed confidentially. For good reason.

They had learned—through confidential deposition testimony and confidential medical records—that I had been recently diagnosed with breast cancer.

I was still recovering from surgery and meeting with my medical team. I had not told people in town. I had my reasons. I was a businesswoman in Fergus Falls, and I was fighting for privacy during one of the hardest moments of my life.

Our response was filed confidentially. I filed a confidential declaration. There were confidential filings everywhere—signals that this was sensitive.

Judge Miller ignored every one of those flags.

And in a publicly posted order, he announced my cancer diagnosis to the community with the stroke of a pen.

Unaccountable

Our once quiet lives have been shattered.

My privacy was destroyed over and over—first by Defendants, then by their counsel, and finally by the judge.

A judge who attempted to pierce our spousal privilege.

A judge who refused to address dozens of protective order violations right in front of him.

A judge who publicly disclosed a private medical diagnosis.

At this point, I don’t have a reason to be silent any longer. But I do have a reason to speak out.

Minnesota’s judges are unaccountable. They can do what they want, and they know it. And the Minnesota Board on Judicial Standards has demonstrated time and again that it will not hold judges accountable for blatantly reckless conduct—or for violations of the Code of Judicial Conduct.

How can Minnesota citizens have confidence in a judiciary that won’t enforce the very protective orders its judges sign?

They can’t.

That’s why Justice-Denied.org is here. We exist to hold judges accountable in the forum of public opinion.  Because we believe that once Minnesotans become informed, they become empowered.