Motion to Compel – Page 135 – Electronic Discovery Law

Peter Rosenbaum Photography Corp. v. Otto Doosan Mail Order Ltd., 2004 WL 2973822 (N.D. Ill. Nov. 30, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Court ordered nonparty to comply with subpoenas seeking electronic records, imposing monetary sanctions for nonparty’s unsupported argument that bankruptcy court’s automatic stay prevented it from having to comply with the subpoenas and ordering nonparty and plaintiff to meet and confer on means for compliance

Nature of Case: Copyright infringement

Electronic Data Involved: Electronic records, including email

Hagemeyer N. Am., Inc. v. Gateway Data Sci. Corp., 222 F.R.D. 594 (E.D. Wis. 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Adopting Zubulake and McPeek approaches, court ordered defendant to restore a sampling of five backup tapes selected by the plaintiff; parties would thereafter be required to make additional submissions addressing whether the burden or expense of satisfying the entire request was proportionate to the likely benefit

Electronic Data Involved: Email stored on backup tapes

Centurion Indus., Inc. v. Warren Steurer & Assocs., 665 F.2d 323 (10th Cir. 1981)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Subpoena seeking non-party’s software trade secrets enforced since trade secrets were relevant and necessary to patent suit and need for information outweighed possible injury to third party

Nature of Case: Patent infringement

Electronic Data Involved: Software trade secrets of third party

Felham Enter. (Cayman) Ltd. v. Certain Underwriters at Lloyd’s, 2004 WL 2360159 (E.D. La. Oct. 19, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Where defendant did not timely object to document requests and belated privilege log was inadequate, court determined that attorney-client privilege and work product protection had been waived and ordered production

Nature of Case: Insurance coverage

Electronic Data Involved: Insurer’s computerized “Z-note” file contents related to particular claim

Kormendi v. Computer Assoc. Int’l, Inc., 2002 WL 31385832 (S.D.N.Y. Oct. 21, 2002)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Defendant ordered to produce all email messages mentioning plaintiff for certain time period; plaintiff to pay the cost of the email search

Nature of Case: Employment discrimination

Electronic Data Involved: Email

Portis v. City of Chicago, 2004 WL 1535854 (N.D. Ill. July 7, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Court granted motion to compel access to database constituting fact work product, where requesting party demonstrated (1) substantial need for the information and (2) undue hardship were it required to compile a similar database from scratch; however, requesting party would have to contribute its fair share toward the expenses incurred in compiling the database

Nature of Case: Class action for civil rights violations

Electronic Data Involved: Database compiled at direction of plaintiffs’ attorneys

Toledo Fair Hous. Ctr. v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 703 N.E.2d 340 (Ohio 1996)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Requiring insurer to create programs to retrieve and put in usable form information from its databases at its own expense, court stated: “[A] party cannot avoid discovery when its own recordkeeping system makes discovery burdensome. If a party chooses to store information in a manner that tends to conceal rather than reveal, that party bears the burden of putting the information in a format useable by others.” However, court did order that request for computer-generated reports be narrowed.

Nature of Case: Minority homeowners brought civil rights action alleging that insurer engaged in redlining to avoid minority neighborhoods

Electronic Data Involved: Insurer’s databases and computer-generated reports

Pamlab, L.L.C. v. Rite Aid Corp., 2004 WL 2988482 (E.D. La. Dec. 9, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Where certain information was not available through defendant’s computer system and cost of recovering information through physical search could exceed damages claimed, court ruled that “prudent course” would be to place cost of physical search on plaintiff and instructed parties to develop a protocol for manual inspection of records at ten (of 3,000) stores; court further ordered defendant to provide available computer records

Nature of Case: Drug company claimed drug store chain improperly substituted one drug for another

Electronic Data Involved: Computer databases

Pamlab, L.L.C. v. Rite Aid Corp., 2004 WL 2358106 (E.D. La. Oct. 13, 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: Court ruled that plaintiff should determine, either informally or during a corporate deposition of defendant, what information responsive to interrogatory could be retrieved from defendant?s computer system and what could only be retrieved manually; to the extent the information could only be retrieved manually, parties were ordered to attempt to agree on a sampling process

Electronic Data Involved: Computer databases

Collaboration Props., Inc. v. Polycom, Inc., 224 F.R.D. 473 (N.D. Cal. 2004)

Dec 01 2004

Key Insight: To enable parties to discuss more meaningfully the proper scope of any privilege and correlative redactions, court ordered producing party to show requesting party’s counsel non-redacted emails at meet and confer, reserving producing party’s right to assert any applicable privilege; court noted that process was especially appropriate since producing party had not argued that disclosure would result in unfair advantage to requesting party, but that material was irrelevant and it feared waiving privilege as to future third parties

Nature of Case: Patent infringement

Electronic Data Involved: Privileged emails

Tag:Motion to Compel