Case Summaries – Page 413 – Electronic Discovery Law

Star Tribune v. Minn. Twins P’ship, 659 N.W.2d 287 (Minn. Ct. App. 2003)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Court’s rejection of media’s request for access to discovery documents produced by parties in litigation and covered by protective order was not abuse of discretion; CD-ROM was not filed with court, and thus was not subject to common law right of access

Nature of Case: Media companies brought motion to intervene and modify protective order in third party litigation, seeking access to materials produced in discovery

Electronic Data Involved: CD-ROM containing 9,000 documents

Toftely v. Qwest Communications Corp., 2003 WL 1908022 (Minn. Ct. App. Apr. 22, 2003) (Unpublished)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Qwest general counsel sent urgent/confidential email to managers notifying them of “legal hold” related to pending SEC investigation and advising about the need to preserve certain categories of documents. The email contained a hidden “tracer” that gave notice whenever someone forwarded the email outside the Qwest network. Qwest discharged all employees who forwarded the email to outsiders on grounds of employment misconduct; subsequent denial of unemployment benefits was affirmed.

Nature of Case: Discharged employee appealed denial of unemployment benefits

Electronic Data Involved: Email containing tracer

In re Verisign, Inc. Sec. Litig., 2004 WL 2445243 (N.D. Cal. Mar. 10, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: District court upheld magistrate’s order requiring defendants to produce all responsive electronic information in native format

Nature of Case: Securities class action

Electronic Data Involved: Emails

Youle v. Ryan, 811 N.E.2d 1281 (Ill. App. Ct. 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Order compelling defendant surgeon to produce his surgical database, to include information related to all the cholecystectomy procedures defendant had ever performed (with the patient names redacted) was abuse of discretion; matter remanded with directions that the court examine the database contents in camera to determine relevance and privilege issues

Nature of Case: Medical malpractice

Electronic Data Involved: Surgical database maintained by defendant surgeon

Fuller v. Instinet, Inc., 2004 WL 3699810 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 29, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Court denied plaintiff’s motion to compel defendants to provide affidavits of all employees with access to employment databases and hiring practices, in order to establish whether any documents or data was destroyed, since discovery had been closed for one year and there was no evidence that defendants had destroyed documents

Nature of Case: Employment discrimination

Electronic Data Involved: Hiring and employment database and records

Network Computing Servs. Corp. v. Cisco Systems, Inc., 223 F.R.D. 392 (D.S.C. 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Concluding that plaintiff’s discovery abuse warranted sanctions, district court ruled that appropriate sanction would be to inform the jury about plaintiff’s misconduct, since monetary sanctions previously imposed had not deterred further misconduct and extreme sanction of dismissal was not warranted by the facts

Electronic Data Involved: Breach of distributorship agreement, fraud, unfair trade practices and related torts

Bovis Lend Lease, LMB, Inc. v. Seasons Contracting Corp., 2002 WL 31729693 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 5, 2002)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Various emails among claims handlers, supervisors, in-house counsel and outside counsel were protected from discovery by either attorney-client privilege, work product doctrine, or both; however, voluntary production of certain emails waived protections; inadvertent disclosure may waive protections if reasonable precautions were not taken to guard against inadvertent disclosure

Nature of Case: Insurance coverage

Electronic Data Involved: Email

Comcast of Ill. X, LLC v. Till, 293 F. Supp. 2d 936 (E.D. Wis. 2003)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Court granted plaintiff’s ex parte motion for expedited discovery and for preservation order; defendant ordered not to destroy or remove any books and records, including those stored electronically

Nature of Case: Cable TV provider sued party alleged to have sold illegal decoders

Electronic Data Involved: Email and business records stored on computer

Dziadkiewicz v. Blue Cross & Blue Shield of R.I., 2004 WL 2418308 (D.R.I. Oct. 13, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Since defendant failed to timely produce database dictionary and did not produce all of its expert’s relevant email, court granted motion to compel production of expert’s email; court further granted plaintiff’s request to reconvene expert’s deposition and would allow plaintiff’s expert to review additional material produced and modify his conclusions accordingly

Nature of Case: ERISA litigation

Electronic Data Involved: Email and database dictionary

In re Grand Jury Subpoena Dated June 30, 2003, 770 N.Y.S.2d 568 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2003)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: DA’s application to compel witnesses to answer questions granted: attorney/client privilege did not preclude attorneys representing individuals connected to events surrounding homicide from answering questions about laptop that was instrumentality of crime

Nature of Case: Grand jury proceedings investigating homicide

Electronic Data Involved: Laptop

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