Motion to Compel – Page 63 – Electronic Discovery Law

Bean v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., No. CV 11-08028-PCT-FJM, 2012 WL 129809 (Jan. 17, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Court granted motion to compel defendant to produce a key explaining the codes used on an already-produced spreadsheet where Rule 34(a)(1)(A) ?explicitly places the burden of translating the data on the responding party? and where the task of providing plaintiff with the meaning of specifically identified acronyms was not overly burdensome compared to requiring plaintiff to figure them out using prior deposition testimony and ?informal communications with counsel?

Nature of Case: copyright infingement

Electronic Data Involved: Spreadsheet

Louisiana Worker?s Compensation Corp. v. Quality Exterior Servs. LLC, —So.3d—, 2012 WL 1668027 (La. Ct. App. May 2, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Court granted writ of certiorari, reversed the ruling of the trial court, and granted defendant?s motion to compel production in native format where plaintiff failed to establish that the discovery sought was ?not reasonably accessible because of undue burden or cost? pursuant to the Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure

Nature of Case: Claims for unpaid portion of insurance premuim

Electronic Data Involved: ESI in native format

In re White Tail Oilfield Servs., No. 11-0009, 2012 WL 4857777 (E.D. La. Oct. 11, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Where the petitioner (for an order compelling production) had access to plaintiff?s Facebook account but argued that merely taking screen shots would not include deleted information and where plaintiff alleged numerous difficulties with using the ?download your information? feature such that he could not produce the contents himself, the court ordered plaintiff to produce the information within 7 days but also noted that because the petitioner had access to the password, it could access the account and utilize the ?download your information? button, which would send that information only to Plaintiff, and that Plaintiff would then be obligated to forward that information to Petitioner?s counsel

Nature of Case: Personal Injury

Electronic Data Involved: Facebook

Fleisher v. Phoenix Life Ins. Co., No. 11 Civ. 8405 (CM)(JCF), 2012 WL 6732905 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 27, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Court addressed Plaintiff?s motion to compel production and declined to shift defendant?s discovery costs where defendant addressed only two of seven factors to be considered when seeking to shift costs but sua sponte entered a 502(d) order to ease defendant?s production burden if they chose to avail themselves of it; court?s analysis made clear that counsel?s resources are not an appropriate consideration in a cost shifting analysis

Nature of Case: Claims arising from insurance company’s alleged improper rate increase

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Fisher v. Fisher, No. WDQ-11-11038, 2012 WL 2050785 (D. Md. June 5, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: After carefully laying out the law surrounding document requests/productions, court evaluated plaintiff?s motion to compel and, invoking principles of proportionality, granted in part and denied in part the motion

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Tompkins v. Detroit Metro. Airport, 278 F.R.D. 387(E.D. Mich. 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Court denied defendant?s motion to compel plaintiff to authorize access to her Facebook account where defendant did not have the ?generalized right to rummage at will through information that Plaintiff has limited from public view? absent a threshold showing that the requested information is reasonably calculated to the lead to the discovery of admissible evidence and where defendant failed to make that showing (court noted, for example, that the pictures available for public viewing on plaintiff?s account did not show activity inconsistent with plaintiff?s claims of injury)

Nature of Case: Slip and fall

Electronic Data Involved: Facebook contents

Bourne v. Arruda, No. 10-cv-393-LM, 2012 WL 1570831 (D.N.H. May 3, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Court denied plaintiff?s motion for access to defendants? computers and other electronic storage devices (at defendants? expense) where plaintiff?s allegations of incomplete discovery and spoliation were merely speculative and were insufficient to justify his request

Nature of Case: Defamation

Electronic Data Involved: Computers, electronic storage devices

United States v. NCR Corp., No. 10-C-910, 2012 WL 4955304 (E.D. Wis. Oct. 17, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Court denied motion to compel production of additional documents in CERCLA action where government had already produced a ?staggering? amount of discovery and indicated that additional discovery obligations would be burdensome and where the information sought would only be of ?limited relevance? to the issues of the case

Nature of Case: CERCLA

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Roxane Labs. Inc. v. Abbot Labs., No. 2:12-cv-312, 2013 WL 1829569 (S.D. Ohio Apr. 30, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Where Plaintiff argued that production of the requested ESI would be unduly burdensome because of the lack of a ?centralized electronic document system? which would require it to ask ?hundreds of employees to search their electronic documents,? and would require ?significant effort to review and produce,? and where Plaintiff also argued that a 30(b)(6) deposition would be a less burdensome method of obtaining discovery, the court noted the lack of information provided to establish the burden alleged and reasoned that ?the mere fact that a party does not have a centralized electronic document system? does not establish undue burden and granted defendant?s motion to compel

Nature of Case: Patent litigation seeking declaratory judgment of invalidity and noninfringement

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

FTC v. Johnson, No. 2:10-cv-02203-RLH-GWF, 2012 WL 2138108 (D. Nev. June 12, 2012)

Dec 01 2012

Key Insight: Where plaintiff produced documents as kept in the usual course of business and labeled some documents to correspond to certain requests and where plaintiff included ?a searchable concordance and an index that identifies the document?s source, description, and date range? the court found that the production complied with Rule 34 and denied defendant?s motion to compel plaintiff to ?respond to the requests for production of documents with organized and related responses?

Electronic Data Involved: ESI

Tag:Motion to Compel