Key Insight: Court denied plaintiff’s motion to compel production of an exact image of the hard drive of defendant’s personal computer and instead ordered that the examination of and production from defendant’s personal computer proceed on the terms spelled out in defendant’s responses to the motion to compel
Electronic Data Involved: PC hard drive
Key Insight: Reversing plaintiff’s $800,000 jury verdict on other grounds, state appellate court expressed concern about spoliation instruction given by trial court since plaintiff had not pursued motion to compel, there was doubt about the materiality and relevance of the data and how or if its absence seriously impaired plaintiff’s ability to present her case, defendant had provided an explanation for the data’s removal from his computer and had offered to produce at least some of the data in paper form or print specific reports, and spoliation instruction given appeared to be excessive based upon surrounding circumstances and spoliation instructions recently approved by Texas courts
Nature of Case: Former partner alleged antitrust violations, fraud and breach of fiduciary duty claims
Electronic Data Involved: QuickBooks data
Key Insight: Court denied plaintiff’s motion to compel production of all documents prepared by four trial witnesses regarding accident investigation, as well as all email between or among them regarding the same matter, where discovery was closed and plaintiff had long known that four witnesses had potentially relevant information and plaintiff never followed up on general production requests nor sought discovery from witnesses directly; court further denied plaintiff’s alternative motion in limine precluding testimony of four individuals
Nature of Case: Wrongful termination
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Key Insight: Court ordered that all hard copy documents be produced on single page tiff images, uploadable on both Opticon and Concordance, and that all electronic documents be produced in their native format with all associated metadata
Nature of Case: Securities class action
Electronic Data Involved: Electronic documents
Key Insight: Where court found that ULLICO had in bad faith “grossly abused” the use of the “confidential” designation allowed under parties’ stipulated protective order, court ordered ULLICO to completely re-do its confidentiality designations and also ensure that the documents were correctly identified in parties’ joint discovery database
Nature of Case: ERISA litigation
Electronic Data Involved: Confidential documents, joint discovery database
Key Insight: Court denied plaintiff’s renewed motion for sanctions where plaintiff had failed to satisfy local meet and confer requirement; parties had previously engaged in meet and confer during recess and agreed on search methodology for responsive documents and emails
Nature of Case: Trademark and copyright infringement
Electronic Data Involved: Spreadsheet; email
Key Insight: Where record showed that defendants’ record keeping was episodic at best, and that existing documentation was inaccurate and possibly manufactured for the litigation, court directed plaintiff, if she wished to undertake a forensic examination of any computer, to provide a detailed affidavit by a specialist who would conduct such testing, including a precise specification of what is to be done, for what purpose and in what period of time
Nature of Case: Breach of fiduciary duty against art gallery
Electronic Data Involved: Computer hard drive
Key Insight: In case where parties disputed whether arbitration agreement applied to plaintiff and motion on the issue was pending, court allowed limited discovery and ordered defendant to choose up to 10 individuals whose files (electronic or otherwise) would be searched for information falling within certain categories
Nature of Case: Patent infringement
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Key Insight: Court granted plaintiff’s request for Rule 56(f) continuance and dismissed defendant’s motion for summary judgment as premature and with leave to refile once defendant had fulfilled all its discovery obligations, where plaintiff had already filed a number of discovery motions and sought, among other things, “information contained in emails which appear to have been deleted by Honda as part of its corporate policy (and which are the subject of a separate Motion for Order Preserving Electronic Data, to Recover[] Deleted Data and Show Cause which is pending before the magistrate)”
Nature of Case: Trademark infringement
Electronic Data Involved: Deleted email
Key Insight: Appellate court affirmed discovery sanctions imposed on two defendants for resisting production of electronic documents on CD, noting: “A CD is simply a copy of the electronic data on the computer. Just as photocopying is proper for copying a document in paper form, downloading computer files onto a CD is an appropriate means for copying the electronic data on a computer’s hard drive.”
Nature of Case: Misappropriation of trade secrets
Electronic Data Involved: CD-ROMs containing electronic documents
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