Case Summaries – Page 159 – Electronic Discovery Law

In re Waste Management of Texas, —S.W.3d—, 2013 WL 203603 (Tex. App. Jan. 18, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Court denied petition for mandamus relief from order compelling re-production of ESI in native format with metadata where Waste Management failed to establish that the order would result in undue burden, among other things; in its analysis of undue burden, the court concluded that a request for production in a ?reasonable manner? was a sufficient to satisfy the requirement that a party ?specify the form? in which ESI should be produced (rule 196.4) and that the estimated expense of $5,500.00 to accomplish reproduction did not pose an undue burden and reasoned, in part, that the order was not unduly burdensome because of Waste Management?s ?conscious decision? to remove metadata from the original production; opinion also addressed Waste Management?s claim that the matters to be disclosed included trade secrets, its claim that the order was overbroad, issues related to the preservation of claims for appeal, and the question of whether Waste Management?s arguments related to cost allocation could adequately be addressed on appeal

Nature of Case: Petition for writ of mandamus

Nobel Biocare USA, LLC v. Technique D?usinage Sinlab, Inc., No. 1:12cv730, 2013 WL 819911 (E.D. Va. Mar. 4, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Court found costs associated with converting information into the agreed-upon format and electronically Bates stamping were analogous to copying costs and therefore taxable and thus allowed recovery of such costs over Defendant?s objection

Electronic Data Involved: Taxable costs

Prowess, Inc. v. Raysearch Labs. AB, No. WDQ-11-1357, 2013 WL 1976077 (D. Md. May 9, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Pursuant to FRE 502(b), the court found privilege had not been waived where production of the at-issue document was inadvertent (instead of producing certain documents within a sub-folder, the whole folder was mistakenly produced), where reasonable steps were taken to prevent the disclosure (trained and supervised contract attorneys conducted privilege review and only 16 of 60,000 documents were inadvertently produced) and where reasonable and prompt steps were taken to rectify the error (plaintiff contacted defendant the day after it learned of the inadvertent production)

Electronic Data Involved: ESI (infringement analysis)

Fawcett v. Altieri, 960 N.Y.S.2d 592 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Court acknowledged the discoverability of social media content but reasoned that ?[i]n order to obtain a closed or private social media account by a court order for the subscriber to execute an authorization for their release, the adversary must show with some credible facts that the adversary subscriber has posted information or photographs that are relevant to the facts of the case at hand,? and thus denied defendant’s motion to compel

Nature of Case: Personal injury

Electronic Data Involved: Social network content (Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, Flickr, etc.)

United States v Finazzo, No. 10-CR-457 (RRM)(RML), 2013 WL 619572 (E.D.N.Y. Feb. 19, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Court found privilege was waived as to an allegedly privileged email received at, and then forwarded to another email address from, an employer-owned email address

Nature of Case: Indictment arising from conspiracy to receive kickbacks from clothing supplier

Electronic Data Involved: Email

Oracle USA, Inc. v. Rimini Street, Inc., No. 2:10-cv-00106-LRH PAL, 2013 WL 1292685 (D. Nev. Mar. 29, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Court imposed spoliation sanctions, including an adverse inference, for defendant?s deletion of a ?software library? despite a duty to preserve

Nature of Case: Copyright infringement

Electronic Data Involved: Software library

Out of the Box Developers LLC v. Logicbit Corp., No. 10 CVS 8327, 2013 WL 3090303 (N.C. Sup. Ct. June 5, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Where Plaintiff sought production of three versions of at-issue software but encountered repeated delays on the part of Defendants and where one Defendant eventually discovered that he was in fact in possession of (i.e., had preserved) the older version of the software that Plaintiffs requested but had failed to discover the information because he failed to make inquiry of ?others under his control,? including his law firm?s IT personnel, the court elected to impose ?the lesser sanction of taxing costs? and ordered that Defendants reimburse Plaintiff for its reasonable costs and expenses associated with its various motions to compel; Defendants were ordered to install a current copy of the software on a laptop provided by the Plaintiff, to provide Plaintiff with direct access to the customized version currently in use by the Defendant/law firm, and to produce to Plaintiff a copy of the recently discovered database backup containing the software as originally installed

Nature of Case: Claims that defendants “stole a series of [Plaintiff’s] software customizations” and incorporated them into their software

Electronic Data Involved: Versions of case management software (original, customized, and current)

Breathablebaby LLC v. Crown Crafts, Inc., No. 12-cv-94 (PJS/TNL), 2013 WL 3350594 (D. Minn. May 31, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Calling defendants collection efforts ?incomplete and somewhat haphazard? where defendant provided no instruction to its chosen custodians regarding the types of documents to search for, whether to check with subordinates, or how to search for documents, the court reopened discovery so that production could ?commence in accordance with the parties? joint ESI plan,? and ordered the parties to meet and confer regarding search terms and an amended scheduling order; court considered proper logging of emails and ordered defendant to produce an amended privilege log that listed each privileged email contained in an email string separately

Nature of Case: Patent infringement

Electronic Data Involved: Email, misc. ESI

Linde v. Arab Bank, PLC, 706 F.3d 92 (2d Cir. 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: On appeal from sanctions order against Arab Bank, court found it did not have jurisdiction over the order for sanctions and dismissed the appeal; court also found Arab Bank was not entitled to a writ of mandamus vacating the sanctions order and the petition for a writ of mandamus was therefore denied

Nature of Case: Knowingly and purposefully aiding and abetting terrorists and terrorist organizations

Electronic Data Involved: Foreign banking information

In re Air Crash Near Clarence Center, New York, No. 09-md-2085, 2013 WL 6073635 (W.D.N.Y. Nov. 18, 2013)

Dec 01 2013

Key Insight: Where Airline sought production of decedent?s son?s Facebook friends list for purposes of assessing the son?s Asperger?s disorder and his ability to socialize and communicate with others, court found the Airline?s argument of relevance unpersuasive in light of the ?ease with which ?friends? can be collected on Facebook? and further reasoned that the production of the other contents of the son?s account (which was provided by his mother – who was a party) was sufficient

Nature of Case: Airline crash

Electronic Data Involved: Facebook “friend list”

Catagory:Case Summaries