eDiscovery Is More Than Requests for Production
Logically connecting special interrogatories and requests for production by subject matter can expedite drafting discovery responses.
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Category: Request for Production
Missing One Email in a Production is Not Grounds for a Default Judgment
There is a universal truth in discovery: perfection is not the standard for discovery responses. This does not mean producing parties can throw caution to the wind for their Rule 26(g) obligations that a discovery response is complete and correct after a reasonable inquiry. However, one missing email is not[…]
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Search Term and Form of Production Dispute, but Let’s Not Forget How Predictive Coding Can Help
If there is a maximum with electronically stored information, parties can fight over basic searches and production formats. These problems often could be reduced, if not eliminated, by retaining a computer forensic expert for collecting responsive data. This is one of those cases where the producing party also wanted to[…]
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Know What You Want to Request in Discovery
Litigants frequently get into motion practice over search terms and not specific requests for production. Hastings v. Ford Motor Co., is one of those cases. The lawsuit involved the purchase of a 2013 Ford F-350 truck in Texas that allegedly had a defective engine. The underlying claims included warranty, fraud,[…]
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Don’t Produce ESI as a Few PDFS Over 8,000 Pages
There are some big “no-no’s” in civil litigation. Printing ESI before scanning it as a few PDFs totalling 8,000 pages for production is one of them. This case had that bad life choice plus a few more. The Form of Production This is a case with multiple defendants getting into[…]
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Saying a Production is Incomplete Does Not Make it True
In an employment discrimination case, the Plaintiff brought a motion for sanctions at the end of discovery for 1) loss of email (plus security footage and printed forms); and 2) inadequate email production. The sanctions motion failed on those claims, but was successful on other grounds for a jury instruction.[…]
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Don’t Go Raiding ESI Protocols
Rule 26(f) requires parties to discuss the preservation of electronically stored information during the meet and confer process. If we think of the meet and confer like the Staff of Ra in Raiders of the Lost Ark in identifying what needs to be preserved, the parties went digging for a[…]
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Further Lessons in NOT Producing Discovery as PDFs
Producing discovery as large PDFs is a sure way to end up in motion practice. In White v Wiseman, such a production was called “nonresponsive to the discovery requests.” White v Wiseman, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 119121, *2 (D. Utah, July 6, 2020). Here is what happened: the Producing Party[…]
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Please Don’t Ask ESI to be Printed for Production and Other Lessons about Rule 26(f) Conferences
Two ways to improve discovery productions is to clearly state the form of production in the discovery request and to have a meaningful meet and confer about producing discovery. Failing to do either can result in motion practice. In this dispute, the requesting party claimed the electronically stored information (ESI)[…]
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Proportionality in Restoring Parent-Child Attachments
Maintaining the parent-child relationship in productions is a long recognized requirement. A Defendant that switched archiving applications learned how tricky preservation can be in a lawsuit when attachments were not included with the parent email in a production. Here is what happened: The Defendant used Mimosa to achieve email prior[…]
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