Motion for Sanctions – Page 92 – Electronic Discovery Law

Brookhaven Typesetting Servs., Inc. v. Adobe Sys., Inc., 2009 WL 1515661 (9th Cir. June 1, 2009)(Unpublished)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where, despite defendant?s destruction of source code and other discovery misbehavior the district court declined to impose an adverse inference sanction upon finding that ?there was no evidence to support a finding that [defendant] acted in bad faith and had intentionally destroyed the earlier versions of the source code,? 9th Circuit declined to disturb the trial court?s decision upon finding the trial court?s decision ?not clearly erroneous?

Nature of Case: Copyright infringement, misappropriation of trade secrets, breach of contract

Electronic Data Involved: Source code

Spooner v. Egan, 2009 WL 2175063 (D. Me. July 21, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: As sanction for defendants late production of relevant ESI and forensic images of relevant hard drives in violation of the court?s order, court declined to impose terminating sanctions but precluded defendants from introducing at trial any documents untimely produced or from presenting witnesses plaintiff first became aware of only in defendants? untimely disclosures; court also ordered defendants to pay plaintiff?s attorney fees and costs

Nature of Case: Copyright infringement

Electronic Data Involved: ESI, forensic images of hard drives

Blangsted v. Snowmass-Wildcat Fire Prot. Dist., 2009 WL 2407655 (Aug. 5, 2009

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where defendants sought dismissal or a new trial based upon plaintiff?s loss of an audiotape of the meeting in which he was terminated, court declined to grant the requested sanctions upon finding that no litigation was pending at the time of the loss, that any prejudice to defendants was small, that plaintiff?s degree of culpability was small and where there was no evidence of bad faith; court nonetheless indicated its willingness to consider the loss in any claims for fees or costs citing plaintiff?s failure to disclose the existence and loss of the tape which resulted in expenses to defendants to settle the dispute

Nature of Case: Wrongful termination

Electronic Data Involved: Audio tape

Edelen v. Campbell Soup Co., 2009 WL 4798117 (N.D. Ga. Dec. 8, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where plaintiff neither objected to nor complied with the magistrate judge?s orders to narrow his discovery request upon the determination that plaintiff?s requests for the entire contents of his laptop and that of numerous other ?key players? was overbroad, the district court found nothing ?clearly erroneous or contrary to law? in the magistrate judge?s subsequent orders that plaintiff?s counsel be barred from taking additional depositions until the discovery requests were narrowed and for plaintiff?s counsel to pay defendants? attorney?s fees incurred for pursuing the narrowing of those requests

Nature of Case: Employment discrimination

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Maggette v. BL Dev. Corp., 2009 WL 4346062 (N.D. Miss. Nov. 24, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where defendants attested to the adequacy of their search for discovery but could not describe their search efforts in detail, court noted its inability to ?say with certainty? whether defendants had fulfilled their discovery obligations and declined to rule on plaintiff?s third motion for sanctions ?until it [was] satisfied that the standards for preservation of electronic evidence?have been met or not met?; court ordered an investigation by a third party expert into ?whether defendants have met the standard for preservation of electronic evidence and disclosed all relevant evidence? with the cost to be borne by defendants

Armisted v. State Farm Mutual Ins., 2009 WL 81103 (E.D. Mich. Jan. 9, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where defendant produced only portions of a requested manual in an alleged effort to save expenses despite its ability to reproduce the whole manual ?almost instantaneously? by computer to compact disc, and where defendant failed to produce other easily accessible and relevant documents, court declined to enter default judgment because plaintiffs failed to demonstrate sufficient prejudice but ordered monetary sanctions in an amount to be determined

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

White v. Fuji Photo Film, USA, Inc., 209 WL 1528546 (S.D.N.Y. June 1, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Court denied plaintiff?s motion for adverse inference arising from former employer?s destruction of her work computer where plaintiff failed to indicate that the computer contained relevant information and thus employer did not have notice sufficient to raise a duty to preserve and where plaintiff failed to establish that the lost information was relevant to the action

Nature of Case: Wrongful termination

Electronic Data Involved: Plaintiff’s former work computer

Stratienko v. Chatanooga-Hamilton County Hosp. Auth., 2009 WL 2168717 (E.D. Tenn. July 16, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Court denied defendants? objections to magistrate?s finding that sanctions were warranted (including a possible adverse inference) where defendants delayed production of relevant notes for four years and where, despite a duty to preserve based upon specific requests for the hard drive at issue, defendants re-imaged the drive rendering the information thereon unavailable, and where the information stored on defendants? network was also unavailable

Nature of Case: Action arising from physical altercation resulting in plaintiff’s suspension from work

Electronic Data Involved: ESI, hard drive

Stein v. Clinical Data, Inc., 2009 WL 3857445 (Mass. Super. Ct. October 2009

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Court ordered plaintiff?s affirmative claims dismissed, for plaintiff to bear all costs reasonably incurred in connection with defendant?s efforts to obtain discovery of plaintiff?s emails, and that the jury be provided an adverse inference instruction where plaintiff engaged in egregious discovery violations, including incomplete productions, installation and use of software intended to delete relevant emails from his computer, and misrepresentations to the court, among other things

Nature of Case: Breach of employment agreement

Electronic Data Involved: Emails

Brown v. ICF Int., 2009 WL 7127925 (M.D. La. Apr. 24, 2009)

Dec 01 2009

Key Insight: Where plaintiff was ordered to produce a relevant recording and instead submitted an affidavit indicating that after a ?good faith search? she determined she was not in possession of the recording and had been mistaken in her representations to the contrary, the court granted defendant?s motion and ordered evidentiary sanctions for violating the court?s order to produce the recording after noting plaintiff?s failure to assert the possibility that she was not in possession of the recording prior to the entry of such an order; where plaintiff destroyed her handwritten notes after transcribing portions thereof, the court granted defendant?s request for an adverse inference

Nature of Case: Employment discrimination and retaliation

Electronic Data Involved: Audio recording, handwritten notes

Tag:Motion for Sanctions