Case Summaries – Page 280 – Electronic Discovery Law

Synventive Molding Solutions, Inc. v. Husky Injection Molding Sys., Inc., 262 F.R.D. 365 (D. Va. 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where plaintiff failed to issue a litigation hold, court ordered plaintiff to issue a litigation hold as to those personnel likely to possess discoverable evidence and to file a sworn declaration describing whether any files had been lost, the methods use to determine the existence of such a loss, the extend of the loss, and the nature of the litigation hold placed in response to the present order; court found plaintiff?s production of documents ?problematic? where it failed to organize the production according to Rule 34 and ordered plaintiff to ?amend? its production to comply; acknowledging that ?the identities of those in control of certain documents is information that may be as relevant as the documents? [substance]?, court ordered search and production of President?s documents despite claims that those documents were produced from other custodians

Nature of Case: Patent infringement

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Statera v. Henrickson, 2009 WL 2169235 (D. Colo. July 17, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Court granted plaintiff?s ex parte motion for a temporary restraining order enjoining defendants from ?deleting or destroying, erasing or otherwise making unavailable for further proceedings? any of plaintiff?s relevant business information obtained by defendants while employed by plaintiff and enjoining the deletion or alteration of email messages and other content in relevant email accounts, among other things

Nature of Case: Claims arising from former employees’ formation of competing business and suspected use of plaintiff’s confidential information

Electronic Data Involved: ESI, emails

Lewis v. Ryan, 2009 WL 3486702 (S.D. Cal. Oct. 23, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Court adopted recommendation of the magistrate judge to impose an adverse inference and exclude certain evidence as sanction for spoliation where defendants indicated they could not locate information, including ESI, which, according to records retention requirements, should have been in their possession at the time plaintiff propounded his request and thus should have been preserved and produced; court found ?clear and convincing evidence that defendants were ?at fault? for recklessly and negligently allowing the documents to be destroyed

Nature of Case: Civil rights complaint arising from service of pork to Muslim inmate

Electronic Data Involved: Hard copy, ESI

Schuler v. Invensys Bldg. Sys., Inc., 2009 WL 425821 (E.D. Wis. Feb. 20, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Finding emails or portions of emails withheld were subject to protection by the attorney-client privilege or work product doctrine, court denied plaintiff?s motion to compel their production; court?s reasoning included discussion of the propriety of withholding email headers and held that redaction of email headers was proper where such headers provided information including: ?the topic of discussion between certain people, the identities of those people, and the time at which the discussion took place.?

Electronic Data Involved: Emails

Flying J. Inc. v. Pilot Travel Ctrs. LLC, 2009 WL 1834998 (D. Utah June 25, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Court granted defendants? motion to compel production of transaction data and rejected plaintiffs? arguments that defendants should be required to make a reciprocal production and that absent such reciprocity plaintiffs? production would be unduly burdensome; court found defendant?s request for use of additional search terms to identify responsive emails was not unduly burdensome where defendant was added to litigation late and where plaintiffs therefore assumed the risk of increased costs in light of expanded claims

Electronic Data Involved: Transaction data, emails

Callan v. Christian Audigier, Inc., 263 F.R.D. 564(C.D. Cal. 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where defendants sought to compel plaintiff?s compliance with a clawback provision intended to control the return of inadvertently produced documents but failed to establish the nature of the privilege claimed or the precautions taken to prevent disclosure, court ruled that defendants had failed to establish that the production of any document was ?inadvertent? and denied defendants? motion to compel

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Am. Family Mut. Ins. Co. v. Gustafson, 2009 WL 641297 (D. Colo. Mar. 10, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Court ordered specific protocol for search of mirror images of defendant?s hard drive allowing defendant to first remove privileged and irrelevant material and create a detailed privilege log and then to produce the redacted drive to plaintiff; upon receipt of redacted drive, plaintiff was ordered to confer with defendant to establish search terms and to use those terms to identify potentially relevant information on the drive; where plaintiffs accessed information later claimed to be privileged, court would resolve dispute and privilege would not be waived

Nature of Case: Violation of Computer Fraud Abuse Act, Colorado Consumer Protection Act, misappropriation of trade secrets, breach of contract, interference with contractual obligations

Electronic Data Involved: ESI, hard drive

Thompson v. Commonwealth, 2009 WL 1025166 (Ky. App. Ct. Apr. 17, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Appellate court upheld trial court?s admission of digital recordings into evidence where tapes were authenticated by officer?s testimony that that the device used for recording had been used more than 100 times and that that the recording was downloaded directly to a computer and then transferred to CDs specifically identified at trial, and where informant testified that the recordings ?fairly and accurately depicted the events of the [recorded transaction]?

Nature of Case: Criminal drug trafficking

Electronic Data Involved: Digital recordings of alleged drug sale to informant

Dirickson v. State, 2009 WL 195744 (Ark. App. Jan. 28, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Trial court?s ruling allowing admission of transcripts of online chats into evidence was affirmed where such evidence was considered ??original? in the context of computers? under the rules of evidence and thus satisfied the Best Evidence Rule; court reasoned that even if the transcripts had not satisfied Best Evidence Rule, transcripts were admissible as copies because the originals had been destroyed, but not in bad faith, and the transcripts (?duplicates?) were authenticated by the officer?s testimony regarding how the transcripts were created and the reliability of their content

Nature of Case: Internet stalking

Electronic Data Involved: Transcripts of online chat

Feig v. The Apple Org.., 2009 WL 1515506 (S.D. Fla. May 29, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where defendant alleged that identifying responsive employee emails was too burdensome in light of inability to search emails electronically, court found defendant had not satisfactorily established inability to search and ordered production of requested emails; court acknowledged that if defendant established the inability to search electronically, identifying requested emails would be overly burdensome and, in the event searching was truly impossible, ordered defendants to move for a protective order supported by an affidavit of a forensic expert providing an explanation

Nature of Case: Employment discrimination

Electronic Data Involved: Emails

Catagory:Case Summaries