Davis v. Carmel Clay Schools, No. 1:11-cv-00771-SEB-MJD, 2013 WL 5487340 (S.D. Ind. Sep. 30, 2013)

Key Insight: Where school did not keep records identifying the individuals who requested that hard drive of camera located inside school bus be removed, nor did school keep logs of who handled and/or viewed such hard drives once they were removed, and hard drive containing video footage of alleged assault was removed from subject school bus and then subsequently reinstalled on a different bus by persons unknown, resulting in overwriting of file containing segment that would have captured alleged assault, court denied plaintiffs’ motion for spoliation sanctions finding no evidence to support a conclusion that the act of reinserting the hard drive into another bus was undertaken in order to destroy adverse evidence as opposed to its being mere negligence in the handling of the hard drive, and no evidence to support conclusion that any employee of the school manually deleted the video files in an effort to destroy evidence; court would revisit issue if additional evidence came to light

Nature of Case: Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 claims that plaintiff was subject to unlawful peer-on-peer harassment that violated his constitutional rights, and that school failed to properly train its officials in recognizing and responding to sexual assault and harassment

Electronic Data Involved: Hard drive from video camera installed on school bus where incident allegedly occurred