Rules Committee votes to repeal ‘ID-free’ certificates

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The Maryland Judiciary’s rules committee has recommended repealing a regulation that would require attorneys, beginning Sept. 1, to certify that each document they file with the court has been scrubbed free of any litigant’s Social Security or other identifying number.

The Court of Appeals is expected to vote in July or August on the committee’s recommended repeal.

Attorneys are already required to keep such information out of their filings, but the controversial rule would force them to certify that they have done so.

Thursday’s action followed strong opposition from district and circuit court clerks, who expressed concern about their duties under the upcoming rule — including the requirement that they reject any filing that does not include the required Certificate of Exclusion of Personal Identifier Information.

“I’m glad it worked out this way,” Cecil County Circuit Court Clerk Derrick W. Lowe, a Rules Committee member, said after the vote.

“It’s going to avoid a lot of unnecessary paperwork and return of documents,” he added. “The workload of the clerks was going to be tremendous on this.”

The Standing Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure’s vote came two days after the Court of Appeals deferred implementation of the certification requirement from July 1 to Sept. 1 to permit clerks to voice their concerns. The high court deferred at the suggestion of Alan M. Wilner, the committee’s chair and a retired Court of Appeals judge.

Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge W. Michel Pierson, a committee member, said the motions before the rules panel could be summarized as ‘the clerks really want no responsibility’.”

But Washington County Circuit Court Clerk Dennis J. Weaver told the committee that he and many of his colleagues were also concerned with the burden placed on unrepresented litigants, who would be bound by the certification rule but were not likely to know about the obligation.

Allegany County Circuit Court Clerk Dawne D. Lindsey, whose jurisdiction includes the maximum-security Western Correctional Institution in Cumberland, said she anticipates receiving many uncertified filings by unrepresented inmates if Rule 1-322.2 is implemented.

“Please repeal this rule,” she told the committee.

Rule 1-322.2 was intended to ensure compliance with its counterpart, Rule 1-322.1, which already requires attorneys to exclude or redact the litigants’ Social Security, bank account, medical account and taxpayer identification numbers from the filings.

Certifying compliance with Rule 1-322.1 is “an added exercise that has no meaning,” Weaver said.

At its public session Thursday, the Rules Committee also voted to recommend that Rule 1-322.1, adopted last July, be amended to state clearly that the obligation to preserve the litigants’ privacy rests with the lawyers and not the clerks.

Plaintiffs’ attorney Ronald V. Miller Jr., who did not attend the committee meeting, said he welcomed the panel’s recommendation for repeal.

Miller said the rule would needlessly require attorneys to certify their compliance with a privacy regulation they are already duty-bound to follow. In addition, failure to certify could doom a litigant’s case as rejection of the file could result in a statutory filing deadline being missed, said Miller, of Miller & Zois LLC in Glen Burnie.

“There is no question that privacy is important, particularly as practical barriers to accessing court files continue to fall,” Miller stated in an email after the committee’s vote. “Hopefully, we can find new ways to meet the objectives of Rule 1-322.2 without the potentially harmful side effects that rule might have created.”