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Does Production of Hard Copies Negate the Need for Native Files?
What happens when you have lost electronic files and a destroyed computer, but you contend your document production was completed before the computer was discarded? To see how that argument went over in a New York appellate court, check out Harry Weiss, Inc. v. Mendez Moskowitz et al., 2013 NY
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Plaintiff Electronic Discovery in Patent Case: Disclosing the Source (Code)
In a case before the U.S. Court of Appeals to the Federal Circuit, the plaintiff held a patent dealing with weather reporting and forecasting. In Baron Services, Inc. v. Media Weather Innovations LLC, No. 11-CV-1606 (Fed. Cir. 2013), plaintiff Baron filed a patent-in-suit claim against defendant MWI, a company that
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Asbestos MDL: Plaintiffs Will be Prejudiced Without Scientific Data
Would it be fair for a defendant to use scientific studies as a sword in litigation, but then wield a shield of privilege to prevent disclosure of the underlying scientific and electronic data used in those studies? In a recent order in the case, In re New York City Asbestos
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Plaintiff Awarded $134,613 as Sanction for Late Discovery Production
What constitutes a valid excuse for late production when answering plaintiff eDiscovery and document requests? An order dated May 22, 2013 in Nuance Communications Inc. v. Abbyy Software House, et al., No. C 08-02912 JSW (N.D.Cal. 2013) considered an excuse from a defendant when ruling upon plaintiff’s motion for sanctions.
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Court Questions Probative Value of Social Media Data for Emotional Distress Claims
In our last blog, we began a discussion regarding the case Giaccehtto v. Patchogue-Medford Union Free School District, No. CV 11-6323(ADS)(AKT)(2013 WL 2897054 (E.D.N.Y.)). In the case, the court rejected the trend requiring a “threshold evidentiary showing” of relevancy of the public portion of a social media account to gain
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Court Rejects Trend Requiring Threshold Showing for Plaintiff Social Media Accounts
As almost everyone is on social media sites, a common issue most plaintiffs will face in civil litigation is requests for production of information and electronic data regarding these sites. Not surprisingly, data from Facebook accounts, both the public and private portion, are commonly requested by defendants as part of
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eDiscovery Question: Is Negligent Destruction of “Irrelevant” Evidence Spoliation?
Our last blog reviewed the facts in the case Cottle-Banks v. Cox Communications, 2013 WL 2244333 (S.D.Cal 2013) regarding the issue of automatic destruction of electronic data from audio tapes. Plaintiffs sought spoliation sanctions for recordings not saved after the case was filed on September 13, 2010, as defendant only
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Plaintiffs Sought Spoliation Sanction for Deleted Audio Recordings: Warranted or Not?
In the case Cottle-Banks v. Cox Communications, 2013 WL 2244333 (S.D.Cal 2013), a court considered an electronic discovery issue of whether spoliation sanctions were warranted against the defendant for the automatic destruction of audio recordings saved as electronic data. At issue in the underlying case, filed on September 13, 2010,
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Qui Tam Plaintiff Awarded $445,505 for ESI Costs
A common topic of interest as plaintiff eDiscovery law develops is what ESI costs and expenses can be shifted to a losing party. In the case U.S. ex rel. Becker v. Tools & Metals, Inc., Civ. No. 3:05-CV-0627-L (N.D.Tex. 2013), a qui tam plaintiff was awarded costs and expenses against
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ESI Privilege Log at Issue in Electronic Discovery Dispute
In the case Dornouch Holdings International, LLC v. Conagra Foods Lamb Weston, Inc. (2013 WL 2384235 (D. Idaho)), the district court appointed a Special Master to review the plaintiff ESI production for privilege. After the data was screened and the privilege log was created and served upon the parties, the