Knotty Issues of eDiscovery
Proportionality analysis can yield surprising results. In a case involving the alleged breach of a patent license agreement over test cups used to screen urine for illegal drugs, the plaintiff sought email from two custodians knowledgeable of the Defendant’s marketing/sales and design/use of test cups. Rembrandt Diagnostics, LP v. Innovacon,[…]
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There is good news on the new Amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure: Magistrate Judges are applying proportionality analysis like it is a shiny new toy. Magistrate Judge Tom Baker in Indiana weighed in on expedited discovery in advance of a preliminary injunction hearing. Southeast Fin. Credit Union[…]
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Proportionality analysis is making its way into judicial opinions with outright citing the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. US District Court Judge Robert Bryan in Washington limited additional searches of email based on proportionality and overbroad search requests. Moore v. Lowe’s Home Ctrs., LLC (W.D.Wash. Feb. 19, 2016, No. 14-1459[…]
Read moreHow do you authenticate “Read Receipt” auto-generated emails? Are the messages hearsay? This issue was raised by a Defendant who challenged “Read Receipt” emails generated by one of the Defendants after reading an email from the Plaintiff. The Court rejected the argument that the “Read Receipt” email was unauthenticated hearsay.[…]
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A producing party claimed that it was “impossible” to produce Gmail in Native File Format because, “Gmail account user and Google does not permit its users to copy e-mails and documents in native format.” As such, the Defendant produced the gmail emails by forwarding them to the Plaintiff. Sexton v.[…]
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Thank You Litigation World! This article won the LitigationWorld Pick of the Week award. The editors of LitigationWorld, a free weekly email newsletter for litigators and others who work in litigation, give this award to one article every week that they feel is a must-read for this audience. A defendant[…]
Read morePuerto Rico once again has issued a thought provoking eDiscovery opinion. It’s about time we hold a conference there. The Court found the Plaintiff had offered sufficient evidence that the Defendant had a duty to preserve the personal email accounts of its former officers. The Court explained the email accounts[…]
Read moreThe important litigation hold cases are not the ones that issue monstrous sanction awards; The important cases are the ones that demonstrate the analytical framework to understand how the law works. These are the opinions that help us represent our clients in knowing what to do when litigation is reasonably[…]
Read moreThere are judges who have a way with words when they want to make a point. One example of such judicial prose was by Magistrate Judge Gregory G. Hollows in Botell v. United States: At this juncture, the United States has purportedly been looking for documents for months, yet the[…]
Read moreA Producing Party (the Defendant) argued against searching for responsive electronically stored information, claiming “that the mere fact an employee might have discoverable information or relevant knowledge does not necessarily mean she possesses relevant documents.” McNearney v. Wash. Dep’t of Corr., 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 108386, 14-16 (W.D. Wash. Aug.[…]
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