Category: FRCP

Court Finds No Spoliation of Security Video Under Third Circuit’s Bad Faith Standard

In Harrell v. Pathmark et al., Civil Action No. 14-5260 (E.D.Penn. Feb. 26, 2015), the Eastern District of Pennsylvania sua sponte considered whether to order an adverse inverse instruction due to Defendant’s possible spoliation of video evidence. Plaintiff filed suit against Defendant alleging negligence related to a slip and fall accident that occurred in

The Dangers of Failing to Meet and Confer Regarding ESI

Courts React Unfavorably When Parties Refuse to Meet and Confer Before Approaching the Court In the complex world of eDiscovery, parties must increasingly cooperate in often unprecedented ways during discovery. Whether parties have to jointly craft complex search term strings or review a predictive coding document “seed set” together, eDiscovery

Court Admonishes Parties For Failing to Meaningfully Meet and Confer

In yet another opinion demonstrating the importance of meeting and conferring with opposing counsel before approaching the court, the Eastern District of California recently admonished both parties in Morgan Hill Concerned Parents Assoc. v. California Dep’t, No. 2:11-cv-03471-KJM-AC (E.D. Cal., Feb. 9, 2015) after the court ordered the parties to meet

Failing to Meet and Confer Results In Annoying a Federal Judge

District Court Judge Rosemary M. Collyer had obviously had enough of the parties’ discovery disputes in Herron v. Fannie Mae, CV No. 10-943 (RMC) (D.D.C. Feb. 2, 2105) when she titled her latest discovery order “Order on One Millionth Discovery Dispute.” The case, which involves allegations of wrongful termination by a Fannie

Does An Alleged Document Dump Comply with FRCP 34(b)?

The plaintiff in Lutzeier v. Citigroup, Inc., Case No. 4:14-cv-00183-RLW (E.D. Mo. Feb. 2, 2015) received an alleged “document dump” by Defendant Citigroup comprised of 46,217 documents, none of which Defendant had organized or labeled as responsive to Plaintiff’s 58 requests for production. Plaintiff also asserted that Defendant had not produced the data in the manner usually

Sanctions Sought Under 28 U.S.C. § 1927 Over Search Term Dispute

Following a dispute regarding search terms, the plaintiff in Leach Farms, Inc. v. Ryder Integrated Logistics, Inc., Case No. 14-C-0001 (E.D. Wisc. Jan. 26, 2015) sought sanctions pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1927, contending that Defendant’s refusal to agree to Plaintiff’s requested search terms unnecessarily increased Plaintiff’s litigation costs. Defendant had requested that Plaintiff produce ESI, including

Attorney Personally Sanctioned After Claiming “There is No ESI”

In modern litigation, can a lawyer ever confidently state that “there is no ESI”? That contention, along with other gross discovery abuses and misrepresentations made to a federal district court, ultimately led the Northern District of Iowa in BFC Gas Company v. Gypsum Supply Co., No C-13-0081, N.D. Iowa (Jan. 5, 2015) to impose Rule 11 sanctions

Lesson Learned: Best Practice Is To Specify Desired ESI Format In First RFP

The plaintiff in Allison v. Clos-ette Too, LLC, No. 14 CV 1618 (LAK)(JCF) (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 9, 2015) learned the hard way that the best ESI practice is to always specify the desired document format in the first request for production. Plaintiff sent discovery requests to Defendant, but failed to specify

Is a Blanket “Attorneys Eyes Only” Designation Appropriate for ESI?

Can a party blanket designate its entire document production, including hard copy documents and electronically stored information, as “Attorney Eyes Only” (AEO)? The Northern District of California pondered this question in the antitrust case Mathew Enterprise, Inc. v. Chrysler, Case No. 5:13-cv-04236-BLF (N.D. Cal. Jan. 7, 2015). Chrysler proposed a protective order whereby all

Digital Photographs Produced In Native Format Comply with FRCP 34

In Kough v. Wing Enterprises, Inc., et al., No. 3:12-CV-250-PLR-HBG (E.D. Tenn. Jan. 13, 2005), the United States District Court, Eastern District of Tennessee considered Defendants’ objections to Plaintiffs’ production of digital photographs. Plaintiffs produced photographs in native digital format and in printed form but refused to provide Defendants with extracted metadata