For The Defense, February 2012 - DRI Today
For The Defense, February 2012 - DRI Today
For The Defense, February 2012 - DRI Today
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Electronic Discovery<br />
when electronic mail was sent or opened<br />
by its recipient(s) or (ii) whether and when<br />
information was created or edited,” and<br />
“may request the software necessary to<br />
retrieve, read, or interpret electronic information.”<br />
M.D. Fla., Middle District Discovery<br />
at 21 (2001). http://www.flmd.uscourts.<br />
gov/<strong>For</strong>ms/Civil/Discovery_Practice_Manual.pdf.<br />
Helpfully, the rules also address the need<br />
<strong>The</strong> standard governing<br />
discovery… remains<br />
broad and subject only<br />
to an individual court’s<br />
decision to restrict it<br />
in a particular case.<br />
for cost shifting based on a proportionality<br />
test, as well as specifically stating that<br />
“[t]he discovering party generally should<br />
bear any special expenses incurred by the<br />
responding party in producing requested<br />
electronic information” and “the responding<br />
party generally need not incur undue<br />
burden or expense in producing electronic<br />
information, including the cost of acquiring<br />
or creating software needed to retrieve<br />
responsive electronic information for production<br />
to the other side.” Id. at 21–22.<br />
To efficiently address e- discovery disputes,<br />
Judge Virginia Kendell of the U.S.<br />
District Court for the Northern District<br />
of Illinois has implemented a case management<br />
procedure for addressing disputes<br />
involving voluminous records. Under<br />
the rule, before filing a motion to compel,<br />
the parties must meet and confer<br />
with an IT representative of the electronic<br />
storage facility to be searched to determine<br />
the most effective way to retrieve<br />
the requested material. See N.D. Ill., Case<br />
Management Practices and Procedures,<br />
http://www.ilnd.uscourts.gov/home/Judges.aspx<br />
(follow “Judge Virginia M. Kendall” link;<br />
then follow “Discovery” link) (last visited<br />
Dec.22, 2011).<strong>The</strong> party seeking the discovery<br />
must also bring its IT specialist to this<br />
meeting to discuss the proper format for<br />
32 ■ <strong>For</strong> <strong>The</strong> <strong>Defense</strong> ■ <strong>February</strong> <strong>2012</strong><br />
the retrieved records. Id. <strong>The</strong> meeting must<br />
take place in person, with both sides prepared<br />
to discuss specifically the parameters<br />
of both the search and the electronic storage<br />
facility. Id. In complex and class action<br />
litigation, although preparing for such a<br />
meeting does have costs given the myriad<br />
of storage locations, formats, the substance<br />
of the information stored, and the different<br />
means by which the information might be<br />
reasonably extracted, the preparation can<br />
benefit a company taking a position on limits<br />
to e- discovery by creating an intelligent<br />
platform for conferring on positions.<br />
Addressing the scope and accessibility<br />
of e- discovery, Magistrate Judge Michael<br />
Mahoney of the U.S. District Court for the<br />
Northern District of Illinois in a standard<br />
order of his creation, “Parties Proposed<br />
Case Management Order,” declares that the<br />
discovery of inaccessible information is per<br />
se burdensome:<br />
All formats primarily used for backup or<br />
disaster recovery purposes and any computer<br />
servers, external hard drives, notebooks,<br />
or personal computer hard drives<br />
created for disaster recovery purposes<br />
and not used in the ordinary course of<br />
business operations are presumed to<br />
present a burden which outweighs the<br />
relevancy of data preserved in such formats<br />
and need not be searched absent<br />
relevance and special need.<br />
P. Michael Mahoney, Parties Proposed Case<br />
Management Order at 3 (N.D. Ill. July 2008)<br />
(standard order), http://www.ilnd.uscourts.gov/<br />
LEGAL/WDADR/pdf/newcmo.pdf.<br />
Similarly, without demonstrating “relevance<br />
and special need, a responding party<br />
will not be required to preserve, review or<br />
produce deleted, shadowed, fragmented or<br />
residual electronically stored information.”<br />
Id. This order places specific limitations on<br />
the discovery of backup systems and residual<br />
information using common sense while<br />
upholding the principles governing the<br />
purpose behind discovery.<br />
In discussing inaccessible electronically<br />
stored information, ESI discoverability,<br />
and which party should bear the costs of<br />
ESI discovery, the Local Uniform Civil<br />
Rules of the U.S. District Courts for the<br />
Northern and Southern District of Mississippi<br />
and the Local Rules of Court for<br />
the U.S. District Court for the Middle District<br />
of Pennsylvania position cost shifting<br />
directly at the forefront of these discussions<br />
rather than as a secondary matter<br />
that a court would consider if data accessibility<br />
is limited or if other factors, such<br />
as proportionality, favor cost shifting. See<br />
N.D. Miss. & S.D. Miss. L. Unif. Civ. R. 26(e)<br />
(Dec. 1, 2011), available at http://www.msnd.<br />
uscourts.gov/2010%20MASTER%20LOCAL%20<br />
UNIFORM%20CIVIL%20RULES.pdf; M.D. Pa.<br />
Rules of Court R. 26.1 (Dec. 2010), available<br />
at http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/docs/LR120110.<br />
pdf. <strong>The</strong> Mississippi federal court rules also<br />
require litigating parties seeking ESI from<br />
nonparties to “attempt to meet and confer”<br />
with those nonparties from which the litigants<br />
seek ESI. See N.D. Miss. & S.D. Miss.<br />
L. Unif. Civ. R. 45(d).<br />
Magistrate Judge Andrew J. Peck takes<br />
another approach specifically endorsing the<br />
Sedona Conference Cooperation Proclamation<br />
and requesting that counsel be familiar<br />
with the decisions in William A. Gross Constr.<br />
Assocs., Inc. v. Am. Mfrs. Mutual Ins. Co.,<br />
256 F.R.D. 134 (S.D.N.Y. 2009), and Mancia<br />
v. Mayflower Textiles Servs. Co., 253 F.R.D.<br />
354 (D. Md. 2008). See also Sedona Conference<br />
Cooperation Proclamation (2008),<br />
available at http://www.thesedonaconference.<br />
org/.Those two decisions addressed various<br />
aspects of e- discovery. <strong>The</strong> first decision<br />
addressed cooperation among counsel, designing<br />
appropriate key word searches with<br />
the assistance of the appropriate personnel,<br />
and testing a search methodology before executing<br />
it. <strong>The</strong> second decision addressed<br />
various discovery violations including the<br />
failure to object to a discovery request with<br />
specificity and seeking overbroad discovery.<br />
In Mancia, the court issued an order<br />
requiring that the parties cooperate to determine<br />
the damages at issue in the case so<br />
that the court would have sufficient information<br />
to perform a proportionality analysis<br />
to quantify a workable discovery budget,<br />
a helpful concept.<br />
Similarly, the proposed Standing Order<br />
Relating to the Discovery of Electronically<br />
Stored Information developed by the Seventh<br />
Circuit Electronic Discovery Committee<br />
strongly emphasizes cooperation<br />
among parties and remaining knowledgeable<br />
about e- discovery obligations and client<br />
data. See [Proposed] Model Standing<br />
Order Relating to the Discovery of Electronically<br />
Stored Information, Seventh<br />
Circuit Electronic Discovery Pilot Pro-