Catagory:Market Announcements

During the New York State Bar Association’s Annual 2005 Meeting of the Commercial and Federal Litigation Law Section, a panel of attorneys and judges discussed current issues in connection with electronic discovery and differences in state and federal courts.

Federal and New York State electronic discovery cases were noted, with substantial discussion centered upon Judge Scheindlin’s Zubulake decisions. Panelist comments covered topics including spoliation, litigation holds, cost shifting, rule changes, and procedural matters.

A transcript of the discussion, published in NYLitigator, can be found here.

In this month’s issue of Corporate Counsel Magazine, Amy Kolz reports on the amazing technology used in connection with the Medtronic spinal surgical inventions litigation. The case resulted in a $560 million verdict against Medtronic, and a $1.35 billion settlement followed.

Attorneys worked from 9 AM to 8 PM piloting seven black computers from a conference room. These “Death Star Pilots,” flying with Attenex Patterns software, sifted through 44 million electronic pages in less than four months. They succeeded in finding critical documents. “I remember seeing that [critical] document and thinking this is the reason we fought so hard for the electronic information.”

The article can be found here.

These damages bring the total awarded Perelman to $1.45 billion in this landmark case where Judge Maas ruled that Morgan Stanley had conspired with Sunbeam to defraud Perelman. Judge Maas’ ruling was due to frustration caused by Morgan Stanley’s failure to produce email.

In his closing argument, Morgan Stanley attorney Mark Hansen said that the failure to produce email was due to error and was not indicative of efforts to conceal evidence.

Click here for the story from Reuters.

A Florida jury awarded these damages in connection with Morgan Stanley helping Sunbeam to falsely inflate its finances. An award for punitive damages is still expected. Morgan Stanley said it would appeal, and additional discussions with a mediator are planned.

Judge Maas had instructed the jury to assume that Morgan Stanley helped Sunbeam inflate its earnings, so Perelman only had to establish detrimental reliance. This instruction had been issued because Morgan Stanley failed to produce email.

More detail can be found here on Bloomberg’s news site.

Gillette Co. said it is “possible” that senior executives deleted e-mail that may have included discussions of the company’s proposed $57 billion acquisition by Procter & Gamble Co. that are being sought by the Massachusetts regulators.

The company disclosed in a filing in Massachusetts Superior Court Monday that Gillette employees whose e-mail may be subject to a subpoena from Secretary of State William F. Galvin “simply did not retain e-mail and, instead, had a regular practice of deleting it.”

Click here for the complete story from The Boston Globe, May 11, 2005.

This article, from the Chicago Tribune and posted on the discoveryresources.org website, provides further detail on the still evolving Morgan Stanley case. The piece also examines the increasingly visible role of email and electronic documents in litigation.

This exceptionally large award was ordered in a landmark employee discrimination case that addressed important e-discovery issues including the preservation of email, cost-shifting, and the restoration of backup tapes.

Zubulake’s counsel told the jury that UBS had destroyed email and its officials had lied in court.

Judge Scheindlin instructed the jury to assume that email not preserved by UBS after Zubulake filed her complaint with the EEOC would have hurt UBS’ case.

UBS says that it will appeal.

The story can be found at here.