Key Insight: Court denied request for sanctions or adverse inference instruction based on absence of video footage of plaintiff after arrest since there was no evidence of bad faith and video security system had experienced a number of unexplained problems
Nature of Case: Plaintiff alleged use of excessive force
Electronic Data Involved: Video surveillance footage
Key Insight: Computer generated diary of investigation of incident by defendant’s adjusting company constituted work product and was protected from discovery
Nature of Case: Personal injury
Electronic Data Involved: Computer generated diary
Key Insight: Finding that requested documents were relevant and properly discoverable, court granted motion to compel production of various financial records, including an electronic copy of party’s Quickbooks files, and ordered that the records be produced under protective order in a form agreed to by the parties
Nature of Case: Securities fraud, unfair business practices, breach of contract
Electronic Data Involved: Electronic copy of Quickbooks files
Key Insight: No abuse of discretion to deny defendant’s motion to compel production of complete copy of plaintiff’s QuickBooks system, where request was made on first day of jury trial and could have come before, plaintiff had already provided a considerable amount of documents to defendant in discovery, and defendant was unable to show that court acted arbitrarily in denying its motion or that information sought would have done anything to bolster its case
Nature of Case: Breach of contract, unjust enrichment, breach of loyalty and other claims
Electronic Data Involved: QuickBooks data
Key Insight: Court overruled defendants’ objections to magistrate’s discovery rulings, concluding that absence of particular email from production did not mean that expert had intentionally hidden or destroyed it, particularly when expert was not listed as a recipient and testified that he did not recall receiving it
Nature of Case: Breach of contract, fraud, negligence
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Key Insight: Court granted plaintiffs’ appeal of magistrate’s order and would permit plaintiffs to raise evidentiary objections to certain evidence at trial, notwithstanding terms of pretrial order which required in limine motions to be filed by certain date, since defendants’ tardy production of hundreds of responsive emails and/or non-compliance with discovery orders made it impossible for plaintiffs to raise those objections as motions in limine
Nature of Case: Beneficiaries of employment benefit health plans asserted class action claims under ERISA
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Key Insight: Appellate court found there was appearance of impropriety which warranted trial judge’s disqualification; on remand, new judge to consider, among other things, mother’s request for production of hard drive from father’s work computer
Nature of Case: Divorce proceedings
Electronic Data Involved: Hard drive
Key Insight: Where defendant demonstrated that serious questions existed both as to the reliability and the completeness of materials produced in discovery by plaintiff, including the possible alteration of email, court concluded that forensic examination of defendant’s hard drives was warranted; court ordered counsel for the parties to meet and confer regarding a protocol for the imaging and subsequent production of responsive documents
Nature of Case: Misappropriation of trade secrets
Electronic Data Involved: Hard drives; email
Key Insight: Court entered preliminary injunction enjoining former employee from violating his confidentiality agreement and ordering him to preserve “all information currently stored on his personal computers, personal digital assistant, mobile telephone, including any information stored on backup media for a period of 180 days”; order also required employee’s new employer to preserve all information currently stored on its computers relating in any way to its recruitment and employment of the defendant, or its ice cream sandwich wafer operations, during the pendency of the litigation
Nature of Case: Misappropriation of trade secrets and related claims
Electronic Data Involved: Computer files containing sensitive product information
Key Insight: Court granted plaintiffs’ Rule 56(f) motion to delay adjudication of summary judgment motion to allow further discovery where collection agency did not retain hard copies of collection letters but instead noted the nature and types of letters on a debtor overview report and saved copies of form letters, and where dispute existed over whether an exhibit submitted in support of defendant’s motion was an accurate reproduction of defendant’s initial communication to plaintiff or a fabrication
Nature of Case: Debtor sued collection agency under Fair Debt Collection Practices Act
Electronic Data Involved: Computer record of collection activity and form letters
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