Key Insight: Production request for all email to or from individual defendant during specified period was overly broad and burdensome, since plaintiff failed to justify the wholesale production of emails and failed to indicate why there would be relevant information concerning her claims in such emails
Nature of Case: Sex discrimination, negligent hiring and battery
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Key Insight: Where defendant represented that it had not located any other responsive documents which were not previously produced, court ordered defendant, with seven days of receipt of the order, to: (1) confirm that a reasonable search for the subject documents was conducted and indicate what the manner of the search was, (2) produce responsive documents, (3) confirm if no responsive documents exist, and (4) confirm instances where the documents were destroyed, indicating by whom and when, if possible
Nature of Case: Class action for race discrimination
Electronic Data Involved: Email and other documents
Key Insight: Court found that local Patent Rule 3-4(a) requires production of source code and granted Plaintiff?s motion to compel
Nature of Case: Patent infringement
Electronic Data Involved: Source Code
Key Insight: Court denied plaintiffs’ motion for sanctions stemming from defendants’ failure to disclose various relevant documents until after the close of fact discovery and plaintiffs’ expert disclosures, though defendants provided the material to their experts; instead, plaintiffs’ experts would be allowed to supplement their reports to address the belatedly-produced material
Nature of Case: Class action alleging violations of ERISA
Electronic Data Involved: Spreadsheets and reports
Key Insight: Texas Supreme Court denied defendant’s request for mandamus relief, finding that trial court did not abuse discretion in ordering production of backup tapes since defendant failed to support its objections as required by Tex. R. Civ. P. 193.4(a)
Nature of Case: Class action against web host alleging contract breach, negligence and violation of Deceptive Trade Practices Act
Electronic Data Involved: Backup tapes
Key Insight: Court ordered defendant to respond to document requests by searching its electronic storage devices and electronic data compilations; plaintiff convinced court that defendant may not have satisfied its discovery obligations by showing that responsive Diebold documents and emails had been obtained from other sources, but had yet to be produced by Diebold itself
Nature of Case: Insurance coverage
Electronic Data Involved: Emails
Key Insight: Forwarding or copying email or other documents that are prepared by non-lawyers for business purposes to a lawyer does not transform such email or documents into work product
Nature of Case: Patent infringement
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Key Insight: After case was removed to federal court, defendant obtained order vacating state court’s entry of ex parte preservation order requiring defendant to “suspend all routine destruction of documents, including but not limited to, recycling back-up tapes, automated deletion of e-mail, and reformatting hard drives,” compliance with which defendant estimated to cost $50,000/month
Nature of Case: Product liability
Electronic Data Involved: Documents and information in paper or electronic format
Key Insight: Emails exchanged between a narrow group of plaintiff corporate business’s non-attorney employees were protected from discovery by attorney-client privilege and work product doctrine; further, statements on plaintiff’s web site waived work product protection for affidavits described therein, but did not waive work product protection with respect to plaintiff’s recorded conversation with competitor’s former employees and email exchanges with them
Nature of Case: Copyright infringement and misappropriation of trade secrets
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Key Insight: Finding no bad faith in defendant’s failure to preserve email since defendants simply persevered in their normal document retention practices, court nonetheless ruled that plaintiff would be allowed to prove the facts reflecting the non-retention of email and argue to the trier of fact that this destruction of evidence, in addition to other proof offered at trial, warranted certain inferences
Nature of Case: Trademark infringement
Electronic Data Involved: Email
Copyright © 2022, K&L Gates LLP. All Rights Reserved.