Case Summaries – Page 305 – Electronic Discovery Law

Ford Motor Co. v. Hall-Edwards, 997 So.2d 1148 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Where trial court granted plaintiff access to all defendant?s databases, including an exclusively privileged database, based upon an unproven assumption regarding ease of production and upon defendant?s violation of a prior court order by failing to provide sufficient information regarding its search efforts, appellate court quashed order noting that defendant?s violations were correctable and non-prejudicial and thus could not justify invasion of the attorney-client privilege or work product

Nature of Case: Personal injury

Electronic Data Involved: Database

Rhoads Indus., Inc. v. Bldg. Materials Corp. of Am., 254 F.R.D. 238 (E.D. Pa. 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Court clarified prior sanctions order and held that where top email in string was not properly and timely logged, it must be produced, however, properly and timely logged underlying messages in string were protected but only to extent that they were ?identical replicas of the version of the message that was logged?; where top message was properly logged, privilege extended to properly logged underlying messages in string but any messages not properly logged were ordered produced

Nature of Case: Breach of contract

Electronic Data Involved: Email

New Albertsons Inc. v. Superior Court, 86 Cal. Rptr. 3d 457 (Cal. Ct. App. 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Court issued writ of mandate vacating award of sanctions against defendant for spoliation of video and photographic evidence where trial court had no statutory or inherent authority to order sanctions absent defendant?s violation of a court order or sufficiently egregious or exceptional circumstances and, where by failing to timely move to compel further response upon Albertson?s alleged deficient production, plaintiffs waived their rights to do so

Nature of Case: Negligence and premises liability

Electronic Data Involved: Video and photographic evidence

Washington v. State, 961 A.2d 1110 (Md. 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Court of Appeals reversed Special Court of Appeals and remanded case for new trial based on State?s failure to properly authenticate surveillance video where State entered video into evidence but provided no testimony as to ?the process used, the manner of the operation of the cameras, the reliability of authenticity of its images, or the chain of custody of the pictures?

Nature of Case: First degree assault and related offenses

Electronic Data Involved: Video Surveillance

Simon Property Group, Inc. v. Taubman Centers, Inc., 2008 WL 205250 (E.D. Mich. Jan. 24, 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Where nonparty demonstrated that a search for ESI using terms provided by party returned over 250,000 files and that it would take three employees working full time for four weeks to review files for responsiveness, and party offered to narrow scope by altering time periods, search terms, and servers, court ordered enforcement of subpoena with provision that both parties work in good faith to reduce its scope

Nature of Case: Breach of contract, RICO and other tort claims

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Advante Int’l Corp. v. Mintel Learning Tech., 2008 WL 928332 (N.D. Cal. Apr. 4, 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Where court had earlier ruled that defendant could recover attorney fees and costs relating to motion to compel and forensic inspection of plaintiff?s computer servers, court denied defendant?s subsequent request for $944,902 in attorneys? fees and instead awarded $105,000 as reasonable amount of attorneys? fees incurred; court further ordered plaintiff to pay neutral computer expert only for fees directly related to forensic inspection and not for those related to defendant’s advocacy in the action

Nature of Case: Misappropriation of intellectual property

Electronic Data Involved: Computer servers

Matthews v. Baumhaft, 2008 WL 2224126 (E.D. Mich. May 29, 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: District judge upheld as neither clearly erroneous nor contrary to law magistrate judge?s order for forensic imaging of defendants’ computers, where defendants had refused to provide documents plaintiff requested, providing only “sample” appraisals, and where relevant appraisals and software used to generate appraisals resided in computer and were relevant to parties’ claims and defenses

Nature of Case: Fraud, RICO and breach of fiduciary duty claims

Electronic Data Involved: Appraisals and software used to generate appraisals

Permasteelisa CS Corp. v. Airolite Co., LLC, 2008 WL 2491747 (S.D. Ohio June 18, 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Court denied motion for adverse inference brought by plaintiff under FRCP 51 one week before bench trial and based on destruction and replacement of computers allegedly containing relevant emails, finding that plaintiff had waived right to seek adverse inference since plaintiff knew about alleged spoliation for over a year, had plenty of time to move for discovery sanctions or raise issue in final pretrial order, and offered no explanation for delay in bringing matter to court?s attention

Nature of Case: Plaintiff alleged fraudulent transfer of assets

Electronic Data Involved: Emails, discarded computers

Kayongo-Male v. S.D. State Univ., 2008 WL 2627699 (D.S.D. July 3, 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Where defendant argued it produce in hard copy format (Excel spreadsheets) all the information that defense expert relied on in creating his regression models, court ordered defendant to produce raw data in electronic format but denied plaintiff?s request to depose defense expert or persons responsible for compiling the information

Nature of Case: Employment discrimination

Electronic Data Involved: Electronic copy of raw, unfiltered data from defendant’s human resource database which defense expert used to conduct regression analysis

Mon River Towing, Inc. v. Indus. Terminal & Salvage Co., 2008 WL 2412946 (W.D. Pa. June 10, 2008)

Dec 01 2008

Key Insight: Nothing that in its estimation, “‘a print-out of computer data’ is significantly different than the report requested here by Defendant or any ‘analyses’ of documents,” court ruled that Rule 34 does not require responding party to create or generate responsive materials in specific form requested by the moving party; however, to extent that party merely requested computer print-out of information at issue, such print-outs fell within bounds of Rule 34 and should be produced

Nature of Case: Negligence, lost profits and indemnification

Electronic Data Involved: Computer printouts

Catagory:Case Summaries