Electronically Stored Information – Page 7

Bringing Reasonableness to Undue Burden

March 23, 2011 Josh Gilliland e-Discovery, Electronically Stored Information, Search Terms, Undue Burden

Hock Food, Inc. v. William Blair & Co., is a dispute over the calculation of the “success” fees paid to the Defendant in assisting the Plaintiff with the sale of their business interests. Hock Foods, Inc. v. William Blair & Co., L.L.C., 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 24874 (D. Kan. Mar.[…]

A Standard for Undue Burden: Excruciating, But Highly Educational and Useful, Detail

March 9, 2011 Josh Gilliland De-Dupe, Discovery, Duty to Preserve, e-Discovery, Electronically Stored Information, Email, ESI, Imaging Hard Drives, Processing, Reasonably Accessible

Discovery Balancing Acts in a War Zone United States ex rel. McBride v. Halliburton Co., is a qui tam action over alleged fraudulent billing for services provided to the US military in Iraq. The case involved inflated headcounts in Morale, Welfare and Recreation (“MWR”) facilities and fraudulent billing for those costs to[…]

A Civil Procedure Car Crash

February 24, 2011 Josh Gilliland Back-up Tape, Civil Procedure, e-Discovery, Electronically Stored Information, Email, ESI, Initial Disclosures

A short Civil Procedure Overview: 1) A protective order must correspond to a discovery request; and 2) A motion to compel needs to have an underlying request. In an auto-recall case, the Plaintiff had produced 1.79 million pages of documents in discovery, plus an additional 84,000 pages of documents from[…]

Fashionable Sanctions

February 17, 2011 Josh Gilliland e-Discovery, Electronically Stored Information, Litigation Hold, Spoliation

When sanctions are issued in Chicago on St. Valentine’s Day, you can imagine how the losing party might feel. The Defendants in a sexual and racial discrimination, hostile work environment, harassment and retaliation case did not properly preserve evidence or respond to specific discovery requests. Northington v. H&M Int’l, 2011[…]

Nothing Says “Bad Faith” Like Throwing a Laptop off a Building

February 8, 2011 Josh Gilliland Duty to Preserve, Electronically Stored Information, Litigation Hold, Spoliation

Is entering a default judgment against a party for destroying a laptop excessive and unduly harsh? Not in Utah. Daynight, LLC v. Mobilight, Inc., 2011 UT App 28, P2 (Utah Ct. App. 2011). Daynight involved a destroyed laptop and what was the appropriate sanction for the destruction of evidence. Certainly[…]

No Triggering Event, No Duty to Preserve

January 31, 2011 Josh Gilliland Duty to Preserve, e-Discovery, Electronically Stored Information, Litigation Hold

In an employment dispute, the Plaintiff claimed the Defendants had a duty to preserve electronically stored information at the beginning of an HR investigation after she sent a letter outlying concerns with her manager. The Plaintiff was ultimately put on a performance review and terminated. Viramontes v. United States Bancorp, 2011[…]

Discovery in a Flash (Drive)

January 26, 2011 Josh Gilliland Document Review, e-Discovery, Electronically Stored Information, ESI, Imaging Hard Drives

Flash drives were the center of a discovery dispute in a trade secret dispute between high-speed printer service providers. OcÉ N. Am. v. McS Servs., 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 5403 (D. Md. Jan. 20, 2011). The Plaintiff sought a forensic image of the flash drives, because the devices contained their software alleged[…]

Putting 4 Terabytes of Discovery on Ice

January 18, 2011 Josh Gilliland Electronically Stored Information, ESI, Meet & Confer, Search Terms

Sometimes, it takes a Court order to cool the fiery passions of litigation. In a RICO action in the packaged ice industry, the Defendant sought to chill the cost of searching 4 Terabytes of data. McNulty v. Reddy Ice Holdings, Inc., 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3173, 6-7 ( E.D. Mich.[…]

Fasten Your Seatbelts: Database Productions in a Searchable Format

January 13, 2011 Josh Gilliland Discovery, Electronically Stored Information

Producing databases is not as easy as fastening your seatbelt and enjoying the flight… A former airline employee sued his union claiming the union “failed to properly process his grievances arising out of his discharge from Northwest Airlines.” Lynch v. Air Transp., 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 138143 (E.D. Wis. Dec. 17,[…]