Seton Hall is now involved in a second lawsuit with former university president, Dr. Joseph Nyre.
SHU’s lawsuit, filed on Feb. 19, alleges that Nyre “illicitly” accessed and distributed confidential documents that formed the basis of a December Politico report implicating Nyre’s replacement, Msgr. Joseph Reilly, in failing to report sexual abuse in SHU’s seminaries, as reported previously by The Setonian.
In a statement to Inside Higher Ed, the publication that first reported the new lawsuit, a university spokesperson wrote that the filing “makes clear that confidential documents were utilized with sections selectively released, causing damage to the University and its leadership and painting a false narrative about Monsignor Reilly.”
According to the Inside Higher Ed article, the university alleges that its information technology team confirmed that Nyre had “improperly downloaded” the documents following his departure from the university, violating “confidentiality provisions in his employment and separation agreement.”
“Pursuant to the Employment and Separation Agreements, Defendant was obligated to return and/or destroy all such confidential information and certify the same to the University,” the lawsuit said.
Nyre departed SHU in July 2023 in a shock resignation, filing his own lawsuit against the university in February 2024. He alleged violations of New Jersey’s Conscientious Employee Protection Act (CEPA), discrimination and retaliation in violation of New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination (NJLAD), and breach of the Separation and General Release Agreement between himself and SHU. Many of the allegations laid out in the suit took aim at then-chairman of the Board of Regents, Kevin Marino, whom Nyre’s wife also accused of sexual harassment.
The Setonian previously reported that Nyre’s resignation and subsequent lawsuit came after the discovery of “irregular financial transactions” occurring within the Seton Hall Law School’s administration, announced to the university community in September 2022. In November of that year, the dean of Seton Hall Law, Dr. Kathleen Boozang, announced her resignation. In December 2022, it was announced that an investigation into these irregularities uncovered a “series” of embezzlement schemes. In December 2024 the former assistant dean of the law school and her co-conspirators were sentenced to three years in prison after defrauding the school of more than $1.3 million.
The latest development in the initial lawsuit that Dr. Nyre filed came in January. On Jan. 27, SHU filed a motion for reconsideration to move the case back to Essex County following its transfer to Hudson County. According to court documents, the court “failed to establish that a transfer of venue was necessary in this matter.”
In this most recent suit filed by the university, SHU officials said that “not so coincidentally,” Dustin Racioppi, the Politico reporter who wrote the original article implicating Reilly, published his story that “contained the very same highly confidential and attorney-client privileged information that Defendant had unlawfully downloaded.”
One of Nyre’s attorneys, Matthew Luber, told Inside Higher Ed that “instead of addressing their own failures, Seton Hall is now attempting to smear and intimidate Dr. Nyre” and that the lawsuit is “a desperate, retaliatory ploy designed to silence a whistleblower and distract from the university’s own corruption and misconduct.”
Luber did not specifically address the allegations that Nyre leaked confidential documents, but he did say that Nyre was the one who warned university officials about Reilly’s “disqualifying” history during his presidential search that was “deliberately ignored” by board leadership.
“Let’s be clear: Dr. Nyre was not at Seton Hall when Monsignor Reilly engaged in misconduct, nor when the board knowingly violated its own policies and Title IX to install him as President,” Luber said.
A second attorney representing Nyre, Armen McOmber, gave another statement to nj.com.
“This is a smokescreen — a feeble attempt to shift blame onto a whistleblower instead of addressing the real issue: the university’s own misconduct and its leadership’s reckless, illegal actions," he said.
Aside from Nyre, the lawsuit names John Does 1–10, referring to them as “persons who are in possession of documents unlawfully maintained, retrieved, accessed, and/or downloaded.”
Racioppi published subsequent updates on the situation for Politico, including copies of two of the documents SHU alleges Nyre leaked. According to The Setonian, one of these documents was a letter allegedly sent to Reilly in February 2020 from the Special Task Force of the Board of Regents, calling for Reilly’s removal from his leadership positions at the university. University officials told Inside Higher Ed in an article published on Feb. 10 that Reilly never received the 2020 letter. They claimed that although Reilly did not report a 2012 allegation of inappropriate behavior by a seminarian to the university’s Title IX office, he “dismissed the offending seminarian from the seminary soon after the complaint” and reported the incident “within the Archdiocesan process.”
“On or about February 19, 2020, Defendant received a copy of a draft letter prepared by the University’s then-outside legal counsel and addressed to Rev. Msgr. Joseph Reilly (“Reilly Letter”),” the lawsuit said. “The Reilly letter is a highly confidential document. Defendant knew that the Reilly Letter was in an initial draft form, was not approved for dissemination, and was never sent to Rev. Msgr. Reilly.”
SHU also requested a temporary restraining order in the lawsuit to stop Nyre from allegedly sharing more documents, according to Inside Higher Ed. This request came after Nyre allegedly refused to execute an affidavit requested by SHU in which he would have confirmed that he complied with confidentiality provisions after his departure from the university and returned all documents and electronic data to the university.
“The continued threat of disclosure of the University’s sensitive and confidential information is precisely the type of ‘irreparable injury’ for which the entry of immediate temporary restraints and injunctive relief is overwhelmingly justified,” the lawsuit said.
A judge has not yet set a hearing to consider the request for the restraining order as of publication of the Inside Higher Ed report. However, SHU “demanded judgment” ordering Nyre to “maintain and preserve” all communications with Racioppi and/or any other reporters or representatives of Politico. The demanded judgment also compelled him to “immediately supply to the University” all of his electronic devices that allegedly were used to unlawfully retrieve files, including his cellphone.
Jacqueline Litowinsky is the head editor for The Setonian’s News section. She can be reached at jacqueline.litowinsky@student.shu.edu.
