Privilege or Work Product Protections – Page 22

Morris v Scenera Research LLC, No. 09 CVS 19678, 2011 WL 3808544 (N.C. Super. Ct. Aug. 26, 2011)

Dec 01 2011

Key Insight: Court upheld clawback agreement between the parties which held that inadvertent production would not result in waiver; where parties entered into 26(f) agreement regarding what metadata need be produced but where plaintiff moved to compel production of additional fields because those provided did not allow him to search effectively or identify the source of particular documents, the court entered into an extensive analysis of the ?form? and ?organization? requirements in Rule 34 and withheld ruling until defendant could provide evidence regarding the burden of providing an index that could allow identification of the source of each document

Nature of Case: State employment claims

Electronic Data Involved: ESI, metadata

Pac. Coast Steel v. Leany, No. 2:09-cv-2190-KJD-PAL, 2011 WL 4704217 (D. Nev. Oct. 4, 2011)

Dec 01 2011

Key Insight: [This amended order corrects an omission to the original order, Docket # 335] Where plaintiffs ?simply overlooked? and thus inadvertently produced 3 privileged documents along with 2.3 million other pages, despite conducting ?multiple? privilege reviews and where plaintiff immediately objected to the use of such documents upon their presentation at deposition and thereafter sought their return before the court, the court found that privilege was not waived

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Orion Corp. v. Sun Pharm. Idus., Ltd., 2010 WL 686545 (D.N.J. Feb. 22, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Court held plaintiff?s and third party?s claims of privilege as to redacted and withheld portions of presentations waived where plaintiff and third party failed to meet their burden of establishing the claim of privilege by failing to establish that all persons to whom the presentation was disseminated or shown were ?individuals who needed to know the information contained in the presentation? as would be required to maintain the privilege

Nature of Case: Patent infringement

Electronic Data Involved: Presentations

Meridian Fin. Advisors Ltd. v. Pence, 2010 WL 2772840 (S.D. Ind. July 12, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: For the receiver?s failure to disclose the existence and specific location of relevant emails by the required initial disclosure deadline pursuant to Rule 26, the court imposed sanctions and precluded the receiver?s use of such ESI at trial; for the receiver?s failure to disclose its access to defendants? privileged communications (including accessing, through the actions of a third party, the personal and privileged emails of one defendant by accessing his personal email accounts without his knowledge), the court imposed monetary sanctions, including payment of the costs of investigating and bringing the motion as well as payment of one defendant?s attorney?s fees during the time his co-defendant provided the receiver with access to his privileged communications

Nature of Case: Receiver filed suit against former officers and employees for myriad of claims, including breach of fiduciary duty, unfair competition, civil conspiracy, etc.

Electronic Data Involved: Emails

Mformation Tech., Inc. v. Research in Motion, Ltd., 2010 WL 3154441 (N.D. Cal. Aug. 9, 2010)(Not for Citation)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Where nearly two months following notice of inadvertent production of privileged materials plaintiff undertook a review of its entire production and production process and thereafter attempted to recall an additional 55 inadvertently produced documents, the court acknowledged that plaintiff ?was perhaps not as diligent as defendant would have liked? in initiating its search, but denied the motion for a finding of waiver

Electronic Data Involved: Privileged materials

Soc?y of Prof?l Eng?g Employees in Aerospace, IFPTE Local 2001, AFL-CIO v. Boeing Co., 2010 WL 1141269 (D. Kan. Mar. 22, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Court denied Boeing?s motion for protective order requiring the return of the privileged email at issue where the email was disclosed by Boeing to a third-party buyer of its ?commercial facility? when Boeing made a business decision to ease transition to new ownership by temporarily continuing to provide email services to the buyer?s new employees (who were former employee?s of Boeing) by allowing them to use and access their email accounts on Boeing?s servers (which contained the message at issue), and thus did not take reasonable steps to protect the privilege; objections to this opinion were overruled by the District Court Judge on Aug. 5, 2010: 2010 WL 3083536

Nature of Case: Benefits and pension issues arising from sale of commercial facility

Electronic Data Involved: Privileged email

United States v. Nagle, 2010 WL 3896200 (M.D. Pa. Sept. 30, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Applying the four factor test from In re Asia Global Crossing Ltd., court found that a memorandum saved on the hard drive of a work-issued laptop was protected by attorney-client privilege where, despite the existence of a policy warning that internet and email was not private, there was no policy banning personal use of work computers, there was no evidence that the employer ever monitored employees? use of work computers, there was limited access by others to the relevant employee?s laptop and such access was only with that employee?s permission, and where there was no testimony that the employee was aware of the employer?s policy

Nature of Case: Criminal charges

Electronic Data Involved: Privileged document saved on work-issued laptop

Helm v. Alderwoods Group, Inc., 2010 WL 2951871 (N.D. Cal. July 27, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Court ordered defendant to identify the authors and recipients of all documents listed on its privilege log and warned that failure or inability to do so would result in waiver; where defendant failed to separately log all messages within email chains, the court recognized a split in authorities regarding the need to itemize each message separately and concluded that in this case, the ?better approach? would be to require defendant to supplement its log with each message itemized

Electronic Data Involved: ESI, privileged email

Alpert v. Riley, 2010 WL 1556566 (S.D. Tex. Apr. 19, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Where defendant previously stored privileged materials on the computer of a third-party business partner and where the relationship later soured, defendant inadvertently waived claim of privilege as to privileged ESI by failing to take prompt steps to protect the privileged materials following clear notice that the protections he had placed (passwords, etc.) were no longer in place and by persisting in that failure to protect the material for a number of years thereafter

Nature of Case: Alleged improper excercise of authority by trustee

Electronic Data Involved: Electronic documents

Lunts v. Rochester City School Dist., 2010 WL 2786519 (W.D.N.Y. Sept. 28, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Where defendants denied plaintiffs? spoliation allegations and opposed their motion for sanctions by asserting that all responsive emails had been produced, court ordered defendants to comply with a prior order requiring defense counsel to submit a declaration indicating whether any relevant ESI had been withheld and why and to provide a privilege log for any such documents and to provide a privilege log for three emails previously submitted for in camera review; failure to submit the declaration or the privilege log by a date certain would result in a $500 sanction for each violation

Nature of Case: Employment litigation

Electronic Data Involved: Emails

Tag:Privilege or Work Product Protections