Case Summaries – Page 234 – Electronic Discovery Law

United States v. Wright, 625 F.3d 583 (9th Cir. 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Court reasoned that the Adam Walsh Act?s requirement that defendant have ?ample access? to examine child pornography evidence did not mean ?equal access? and ruled that where defendant?s expert was given access to the evidence under certain conditions (including time and place restrictions) but not provided with a mirror image of the drive to examine at will and where the expert was expressly ?comfortable? with that arrangement and was afforded 14 months to examine the evidence, ?ample access? was provided

Nature of Case: Child Pornography

Electronic Data Involved: Hard drive containing the pornographic images

United States v. Hornback, 2010 WL 4628944 (E.D. Ky. Nov. 8, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Where defendant?s expert was offered the opportunity to examine the seized computer in a private, unmonitored room as often as necessary and to consult with defendant by phone during the examination, but where simultaneous internet access was not provided, the court found that ?ample opportunity? for inspection had been provided and denied defendant?s motion to compel an altered version of the hard drive with actual photographs removed

Nature of Case: Possession of child pornography

Electronic Data Involved: Hard drive

Commonwealth v. Suarez-Irizzary, 2010 WL 5312257 (Pa. Comm. Pl. Aug. 6, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Court upheld the Commonwealth?s request to establish the school zone applicability using measurements from Google Earth upon finding that the measurement was properly authenticated by testimony that the accuracy of the measurement had been verified by comparing Google Earth?s results to a known distance between two points as established by independent, manual measuremen

Nature of Case: Drug charges

Electronic Data Involved: Google Earth measurement

Hilton-Rorar v. State and Fed. Commc?ns, Inc., 2010 WL 1486916 (N.D. Ohio Apr. 13, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Addressing several questions regarding attorney-client privilege and work product, court stated that ?attachments or other email communications that are not otherwise independently privileged? but are contained within or attached to a privileged email were protected by the privilege where ?the disclosure of those emails would necessarily reveal the substance of a confidential client communication made seeking legal advice? and declined to compel their disclosure or the disclosure of the emails to which they were attached

Electronic Data Involved: Privileged emails

Chevron Corp. v. Stratus Consulting, Inc., 2010 WL 3489922 (D. Colo. Aug. 31, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Court granted petitioner?s motion to compel production of subpoenaed information in native format, including re-production of materials already produced in .pdf format, where, despite respondent?s objections, the court determined the underlying metadata could be probative, but ordered petitioner to bear the cost where the subpoena had been ?less than clear? regarding the format of production and where respondents? claims of undue burden ?carrie[d] some legitimacy?; court?s opinion acknowledged respondent?s argument regarding the inability to Bates stamp native documents and ordered that the documents be Bates-stamped ?only as technologically possible?

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Response Personnel, Inc. v. Aschenbrenner, 909 N.Y.S.2d 433 (N.Y. App. Div. 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Where a lower court denied plaintiff?s motion for a protective order and ordered the production of tax returns and other documents in electronic format at plaintiff?s expense, the appellate court affirmed the denial of the protective order and the order compelling electronic production but found that requiring plaintiff to bear the costs imposed an undue burden where ?generally, the costs of production is borne by the party requesting the production, and the cost of creating electronic documents here would not be inconsequential?

Electronic Data Involved: Tax returns and other documents in electronic form

United States v. Perraud, 2010 WL 228013 (S.D. Fla. Jan. 14, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Despite finding Fed. R. Crim. P. 16 did not require the government to identify the evidence upon which it intended to rely at trial where defendants claimed the government had attempted to overwhelm them by providing access to a database containing millions of documents, and despite government?s production of an index to the database and directions to the materials it deemed most relevant, magistrate recommended the government be ordered to provide defendants with an exhibit list and hard copies of the exhibits ten days before trial, for the government to supplement that list as necessary, and for the government to comply in good faith where the government had previously offered to supply the same

Nature of Case: Conspiracy to destroy records and destruction of records

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Actionlink, LLC v. Sorgenfrei, 2010 WL 395243 (N.D. Ohio Jan. 27, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Where issues of material fact existed as to the willfulness of defendant?s destruction of potentially relevant ESI and as to whether such destruction ?disrupted? plaintiff?s case, court denied defendant?s motion for summary judgment as to its claim of spoliation and denied plaintiff?s request for an adverse inference as to claims 1 through 4, but indicated its willingness to entertain a motion for an appropriate jury instruction at trial

Nature of Case: Breach of confidentiality agreement and related claims, independant cause of action for spoliation

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Edelen v. Campbell Soup Co., 2010 WL 774186 (N.D. Ga. Mar. 2, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Court ordered 4 pages of privileged documents be returned to defendants where the pages were privileged on their face and inadvertently produced (4 pages of privileged material were produced among 2000 pages and the documents were subject to review by three attorneys prior to production) and where counsel immediately sought their return upon discovery of their production; court ordered narrowing of search terms and fewer custodians upon defendants? objection to plaintiffs? proposed scope (including 55 custodians and 50 search terms) where plaintiff failed to respond to the objection within the ten day period provided by the court

Nature of Case: Employment litigation

Electronic Data Involved: ESI, privileged materials

State v. Durham, 2010 WL 1254355 (Ohio App. Ct. Apr. 1, 2010)

Dec 01 2010

Key Insight: Where defendant appealed his conviction and argued the State?s failure to preserve videotape depicting a struggle between police and defendant was a violation of due process, court found the videotape was not subject to production pursuant to Brady absent evidence that it contained ?materially exculpatory evidence?, and that absent evidence of bad faith, defendant could not show a due process violation arising from the destruction of ?potentially useful? evidence

Nature of Case: Criminal

Electronic Data Involved: Surveillance video

Catagory:Case Summaries