Archive - 2005

Williams v. Mass. Mut. Life Ins. Co., 226 F.R.D. 144 (D. Mass. 2005)

In this wrongful termination case, plaintiff sought the court’s help in obtaining from defendant employer a particular email he claimed to have seen and possessed at one point, but no longer possessed. He sought an order appointing a neutral computer forensics expert to conduct the search for the email, and, in the event the email was discovered, to conduct an additional, more detailed electronic investigation “‘to locate and retrieve all electronic communications related to his employment and termination that have not as yet been produced by defendants.'” He also sought an order requiring defendants to “‘preserve all documents and information, whether in electronic or paper form, to suspend all recycling of any backup tapes, any automated deletion of e-mail, the reformatting of hard drives, and/or that an appropriate medium for retention of this type of data be disclosed and utilized.'” Read More

Green v. Baca, 225 F.R.D. 612 (C.D.Cal. 2005)

In this case, the court found that plaintiff’s efforts to obtain discovery regarding the over-detention of inmates in the Los Angeles County jail system were “unduly complicated and extraordinarily delayed by the failure of the County and/or its counsel to investigate promptly and effectively the records available, both in hard-copy and computer-based formats, regarding such over-detentions.” For almost nine months, the court and plaintiff’s counsel were never specifically apprised of the availability of computer-based records regarding over-detentions, despite extensive questioning by the court and court orders that declarations be provided regarding the availability of such documents and the burden associated with their production. Read More

Treace v. UNUM Life Ins. Co., 2004 WL 3142215 (W.D.Tenn. Aug. 10, 2004)

Insured sued UNUM Life Insurance Company for breach of contract, bad faith, and related torts based upon Unum’s denial of her disability claim. In response to an interrogatory seeking the identities of individuals who had contact with plaintiff about the claim, Unum represented that any record of telephone conversations with a claimant were kept in the claim file (which had already been produced) and it would be the same burden on both parties to search through those records to compile a “telephone log.”

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Icu Medical, Inc. v. B. Braun Medical, Inc., 2005 WL 151927 (N.D.Cal. Jan. 4, 2005)

In response to a joint discovery dispute letter in which defendant sought an order requiring plaintiff to conduct an adequate search for documents in response to defendant’s production requests, the magistrate judge ordered:

(1) To the extent not already completed, plaintiff shall search all computerized files, emails, voice mails, work files, desk files, calendars and diaries, and any other locations and sources if materials of the type to be produced might plausibly be expected to be found there. Said search shall be completed no later than January 25, 2005;

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Streamline Capital, LLC v. Hartford Cas. Ins. Co., 2005 WL 66898 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 11, 2005)

Previously, the defendant had sought sanctions for spoliation of evidence, arguing that plaintiff’s two principals (key witnesses in the case) had systematically deleted potentially relevant emails before and during the litigation. At that time, the magistrate judge deferred any decision on sanctions and ordered the two witnesses to consent to the production of pertinent emails still available through their email service companies in order to determine, to the extent possible, the degree of prejudice defendant suffered by virtue of the deletions. See Streamline Capital LLC v. Hartford Cas. Ins. Co., 2004 WL 2663564 (S.D.N.Y. Nov. 19, 2004). The court ordered that any recovered emails be delivered to plaintiff’s counsel to review for privilege, and that the balance of the emails be produced to defendant. This most recent opinion addresses defendant’s motion to compel production of several of the recovered emails withheld by plaintiff as privileged.

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Burrell v. Anderson, 353 F.Supp.2d 55 (D. Me. 2005)

Plaintiff sued county and various employees of police department and attorney general’s office alleging due process, equal protection, First Amendment, and civil rights conspiracy claims stemming from incidents involving either plaintiff and his former girlfriend, or their daughter. Plaintiff contended that the defendant employees improperly responded or unacceptably failed to respond to these incidents because of gender-discriminatory attitudes and policies pertaining to domestic abuse. Read More

DirecTV, Inc. v. Borow, 2005 WL 43261 (N.D.Ill. Jan. 6, 2005)

In this case, the court granted summary judgment in favor of plaintiff DirecTV and against defendant Randy Borow on claims stemming from Borow’s unauthorized use of plaintiff’s satellite television signal. Summary judgment was warranted, in part, because defendant had not offered sufficient evidence to rebut the presumption that arose from his destruction of relevant evidence.

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In re Telxon Corp. Securities Litigation, 2004 WL 3192729 (N.D.Ohio July 16, 2004)

Recommending that default judgment on liability be entered against third party defendant, PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP, the judge stated “it would be difficult for anyone to argue that PWC’s conduct over the course of the litigation, particularly its repeated assurances to the court and to the parties that it had fully disclosed all relevant information, was not due to willfulness, bad faith or fault.” The judge criticized PWC for, among other things: failing at the start of discovery to check thoroughly its local servers and its archives for relevant documents, failing to produce documents as they were kept in the ordinary course of business, failing to reproduce thoroughly and accurately all documents and their attachments, and, prior to litigation, permitting the destruction of documents despite committing to their preservation. The court stated the only conclusion it can reach “is that PWC and/or its counsel engaged in deliberate fraud or was so recklessly indifferent to their responsibilities as a party to litigation that they failed to take the most basic steps to fulfill those responsibilities.”

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