Diego Sarabia's lawyers asked a New York judge to limit out-of-court statements in Jane Doe's Cornell lawsuit.

An order to show cause asks a judge to set a hearing and to decide whether any temporary limits should apply before that hearing. Neither the Oct. 9 papers nor TMZ's Monday story reports that a judge has signed one, and the proposed limits would cover the parties and their lawyers, not the press. Jane Doe's civil claims remain allegations in a case where no one has been criminally charged.

TMZ reported Monday, Oct. 12, 2026, that lawyers for Diego Sarabia, one of seven men named in the civil lawsuit brought by the former Cornell student identified as Jane Doe, asked a New York judge to rein in public statements by her attorney, Thomas Giuffra. The papers themselves are NYSCEF document 49, an attorney affirmation by James C. Knox, and document 50, a memorandum of law. Both were filed with the New York County Clerk at 7:45 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 9, 2026, in Jane Doe v. Cornell University, Inc. et al., Index No. 161704/2026. Knox and Alishah Bhimani, of Hacker Murphy LLP in Albany, signed for Sarabia. The memorandum says the suit concerns allegations of sexual assault and related claims from events Jane Doe alleges occurred on the night of Oct. 19, 2024, and the morning of Oct. 20, 2024, while she was an undergraduate at Cornell. It says she seeks damages and has demanded a jury trial. Knox's affirmation says the case is still at the start: some parties have not appeared, no answers have been filed, and discovery has not begun. He says no earlier application for this relief was made. A filing is a request. It is not a signed order.

What the papers ask for is a limit on the people in the case, not on reporters. The memorandum says Sarabia wants narrowly tailored restrictions on extrajudicial statements by the parties and their counsel, together with interim relief pending the return date. It says the proposed order would not restrain the press, close the courtroom, or cut off access to judicial records that remain public. It says the limits would reach participating parties, their attorneys, and their legal representatives, and would use a substantial-likelihood-of-material-prejudice standard. Knox's affirmation says the same thing: the relief is directed only to participating attorneys and parties, and it does not seek to restrain the press. TMZ reported that the proposed order would apply to both sides, limiting what they can say publicly and stopping them from sharing private information or evidence that has not been made public. The papers also ask the court to schedule a return date. They do not print one. TMZ did not report that a judge had granted the request.

The affirmation's examples are television statements it attributes to Giuffra. It says that on Oct. 2, 2026, he told CBS that Jane Doe "didn't have consent from the time she walked in the door; she was incapable of consent," and that he said, "I'm more and more convinced there was a cover-up." It says that on Oct. 5 he told CNN that the fraternity held meetings with the intention to "cover up" what had happened, and that it was interested in "protecting the fraternity, protecting the fraternity brothers and keeping it as business as usual – not justice." It says that on Oct. 2 he told NBC that Jane Doe was "hanging on by a string" and that "This has upended her life in such a tragic way." The affirmation says those are examples, not a full list, and that Giuffra has also addressed the credibility, character, and reputation of defendants. TMZ reported Monday that the lawyers described an "orchestrated campaign" and pointed to interviews in which Giuffra accused Cornell of a cover-up, claimed evidence was destroyed, and suggested more men may have taken part in the alleged assault. Knox uses the words "orchestrated campaign" and says reporting indicated the publicity was planned. He cites a CNN interview in which Cornell Daily Sun senior editor Cereese Qusba said she had communicated with Jane Doe and her lawyers before the suit was filed. Those are the lawyers' characterizations of interviews. They have not been tested as evidence.

The same Friday's sealing order is the backdrop the papers use, not a ruling on this motion. Knox says the court had already found that information in filed documents was used to threaten and dox a nonparty's family after an erroneous address was associated with a defendant. He says the court's Oct. 9, 2026 decision and order called the reported threats and doxing dangerous internet vigilantism, sealed NYSCEF documents 1, 6, 7, and 22, and ordered Jane Doe to refile redacted versions that omit purported addresses. Crime Talk Network is not naming that family. The woman in the lawsuit is referred to only as Jane Doe. This motion is in the civil case. No one has been criminally charged. Attorney General Letitia James is the special prosecutor reviewing the matter, which is separate from whether a judge limits what the civil parties and their lawyers say outside court. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.