Case Summaries – Page 354 – Electronic Discovery Law

A/R Roofing, L.L.C. v. Certainteed Corp., 2006 WL 2381610 (D. Kan. Aug. 16, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Where the font used by plaintiff’s expert in his hard copy list of customer estimates and contracts was ?incredibly small? and difficult to read without magnification, thus rendering hard copy list inadequate, and because defendant’s request for production of material in electronic form was not otherwise prohibited by scheduling order, court granted defendant’s motion to compel the data in electronic format

Nature of Case: Plaintiff claimed loss of business resulting from letter sent by defendant

Electronic Data Involved: Customer list

Frees, Inc. v. McMillian, 2006 WL 2668843 (E.D. Tenn. Sept. 15, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Court narrowed subpoena to defendant’s new employer, setting out “tiered discovery” process: plaintiff was to identify at least one project involving files allegedly removed from disputed laptop; new employer would then search for documents and/or files of the type described that were related to that project and produce them; if any of the produced documents and/or files were shown to be relevant or reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence, then the parties would proceed to the ?second tier? of discovery and plaintiff could then request documents related to other projects; if no responsive documents could be found with respect to the first identified projects, however, plaintiff would be required to make a sufficient showing to the court as to why discovery should proceed further

Nature of Case: Design firm sued former vice president under Computer Fraud and Abuse Act

Electronic Data Involved: Proprietary business and technological data

Plasse v. Tyco Elecs. Corp., 2006 WL 3445610 (D. Mass. Nov. 8, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: In follow up to earlier decision dismissing complaint as sanction for plaintiff’s discovery misconduct, court awarded defendant $35,000 in attorneys’ fees and full costs of $20,472 since forensic computer experts were “particularly necessary to uncover plaintiff’s skulduggery”

Nature of Case: Wrongful termination

Electronic Data Involved: Laptop; drafts of plaintiff’s resume

Malletier v. Dooney & Bourke, Inc., 2006 WL 3851151 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 22, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Court directed defendants to confirm in writing whether it searched particular email accounts or conduct such search if it had not already done so; court further denied plaintiff’s request for spoliation sanctions based upon defendant’s alleged failure to preserve chat room comments since it was highly unlikely that any comments by members of the public that would be pertinent to the lawsuit would have been received, since chat room was opened after relevant time period and technology to save chat room comments was not installed until over a year later

Nature of Case: Trademark infringement

Electronic Data Involved: Chat room comments; email

Elion v. Jackson, 2006 WL 2583694 (D.D.C. Sept. 8, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Where defendant did not produce a particular email in response to interrogatories or document requests and it only came to light during a deposition a few days before the close of all discovery, court granted plaintiff’s motion for sanctions under Rule 37(c)(1) and ordered that defendant be precluded from offering in evidence any and all documents not timely produced during discovery, including the subject email, and from offering the testimony of any witness with respect to the email or any other documents not timely disclosed

Electronic Data Involved: Email

Marshall & Swift, L.P. v. Crawford & Co., 2006 WL 319262 (N.D. Ga. Feb. 9, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Court granted defendant’s motion for reconsideration and clarification of order extending discovery cut off, confirming that defendant would be allowed to engage in limited discovery in order to rebut plaintiff’s evidence of software usage documented in plaintiff’s spreadsheets, and to explore the source data for entries on the spreadsheets

Nature of Case: Plaintiff sought damages stemming from defendant’s use of plaintiff’s claims software

Electronic Data Involved: Spreadsheet

Happel v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 2006 WL 642562 (N.D. Ill. Mar. 8, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Where plaintiff alleged that Wal-Mart Pharmacy wrongly filled a prescription for a drug to which she was allergic, and that Wal-Mart’s computer system would have listed plaintiff’s drug allergies, flashed a warning and required further protocols before the drug could be dispensed to plaintiff, court granted motion to compel production of the computer used by the pharmacist (on August 4, 1993) and any reports or logs relating to the computer’s repair, maintenance or malfunction

Nature of Case: Personal injury

Electronic Data Involved: Computer used by particular Wal-Mart Pharmacy in 1993 and reports or logs relating to computer’s repair, maintenance or malfunction

Employers Ins. Co. of Wausau v. Nationwide Mut. Fire Ins. Co., 2006 WL 1120632 (E.D.N.Y. Apr. 26, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Court found that the computerized claim file was clearly relevant, irrespective of whether plaintiffs intended to use the documents or not in the litigation, and ordered plaintiffs to produce the complete claim file, including hard copies and electronic documents, to the extent such documents were not privileged or prepared for the sole purpose of “probable” or “imminent” litigation

Nature of Case: Insurance coverage

Electronic Data Involved: Electronic claim file

In re NYSE Specialists Sec. Litig., 2006 WL 1704447 (S.D.N.Y. June 14, 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Court ordered that all hard copy documents be produced on single page tiff images, uploadable on both Opticon and Concordance, and that all electronic documents be produced in their native format with all associated metadata

Nature of Case: Securities class action

Electronic Data Involved: Electronic documents

In re ULLICO Inc. Litig., 237 F.R.D. 314 (D.D.C. 2006)

Dec 01 2006

Key Insight: Where court found that ULLICO had in bad faith “grossly abused” the use of the “confidential” designation allowed under parties’ stipulated protective order, court ordered ULLICO to completely re-do its confidentiality designations and also ensure that the documents were correctly identified in parties’ joint discovery database

Nature of Case: ERISA litigation

Electronic Data Involved: Confidential documents, joint discovery database

Catagory:Case Summaries