Our Insights on eDiscovery

Court Denies Defendant’s Motion for Production of Documents for In Camera Review: eDiscovery Case Law

October 4, 2016

In Portland Pipe Line Corp. et. al. v. City of South Portland et. al., Maine Magistrate Judge John H. Rich, III denied the defendants’ motion to compel the production of documents withheld or redacted on claims of attorney-client privilege by the plaintiff, finding that the plaintiffs “undertook a costly and labor-intensive two-step process with respect to claiming privilege as to ESI, first relying on a technologically-assisted privilege review by a hired ESI discovery vendor” and then undertaking a “painstaking manual review to verify the privileged status of every ESI document marked as privileged”.

“Master” Your Knowledge of eDiscovery One More Time – In Our Nation’s Capital!: eDiscovery Trends

October 3, 2016

Back in May, I was excited and honored to moderate an enjoyable panel session in Chicago at The Masters Conference event there. Then, we did it again in July in New York City. Now, we’re doing it again later this month, this time in our nation’s capital, Washington DC!

Appeals Court Upholds Default Judgment for Discovery Violations, Including Wiping Files from Laptop: eDiscovery Case Law

September 30, 2016

In Trude et. al. v. Glenwood State Bank, et. al., a Minnesota Appeals Court affirmed the trial court’s entry of default judgment for repeated discovery violations, including using data wiping software to permanently delete more than 20,000 files from a laptop just hours before it was turned over for forensic examination.

In This Election Season, Contested Elections May Require eDiscovery to Sort Out the Results: eDiscovery Trends

September 29, 2016

Remember the 2000 Presidential election and all of the issues and headaches that resulted from punch card “butterfly” ballots and “hanging chads” down in Florida? These days, electronic ballots are more popular. However, using those electronic ballots doesn’t solve all problems and, if there are disputes, there may be a need for eDiscovery professionals to sort out the results.

If Plaintiff Wants Discovery on Defendant’s Backup Tapes, Court Rules He Must Pay for Them: eDiscovery Case Law

September 28, 2016

In Elkharwily v. Franciscan Health Sys., Washington District Judge Robert J. Bryan, finding that the defendant had met its burden to show that retrieving electronically stored information on backup tapes “would result in an undue burden and cost to Defendant”, that the plaintiff “has not met his burden to show good cause” to overcome the defendant’s undue burden and cost argument, and that “the archived emails are ‘discoverable’ under Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1)”, ordered the defendant to “facilitate access to the discovery”, but “only at Plaintiff’s expense, payable in advance”.

Janice Jaco and Brandye Fenn of LTC4: eDiscovery Trends

September 27, 2016

Today’s thought leaders are Janice Jaco and Brandye Fenn of the Legal Technology Core Competencies Certification Coalition (LTC4). ACEDS’ 2015 eDiscovery Person of the Year, Janice, is the senior eDiscovery Project Manager for boutique litigation powerhouse Keesal, Young & Logan (KYL). Janice’s professional volunteer work includes extensive involvement in authoring LTC4’s eDiscovery Core Competency, participation in ACEDS’ CEDS Exam Standard Setting Exercise, and updating ACEDS’ University online content. Brandye is the Litigation Support Manager at Ford Harrison LLP. With more than 28 years’ of law firm experience as a litigation paralegal, Brandye is responsible for managing eDiscovery projects for the firm’s 20+ offices, nationally. In 2011, she founded the FordHarrison Litigation Support Department and, through her extensive knowledge of eDiscovery best practices and industry standards, established and implemented new review and processing workflows and procedures.

The Readers Have Spoken, in New York: eDiscovery Trends

September 26, 2016

Last week, the New York Law Journal (NYLJ) published its seventh annual Reader Rankings, where the New York legal community cast their votes for your favorite vendors. Over 8,000 people cast votes for their favorite vendors in 100+ categories! That’s a lot of people and a lot of categories. Here are the reader rankings for electronic discovery and information governance.

Drinks with Me, On Me!: eDiscovery Trends

September 23, 2016

The ARMA Live! Conference & Expo for Records Management and Information Governance professionals is coming to San Antonio this Sunday for three days and CloudNine will be there. If you plan to attend the show or are in the San Antonio area, come have drinks with me on Sunday – I’m buying!

Hashing Out the Idea of a Standard Hash Algorithm for Vendors: eDiscovery Best Practices

September 22, 2016

In a blog post earlier this month, Craig Ball discussed the question (which was posed at the recent ILTACON conference by Beth Patterson, Chief Legal & Technology Services Officer for Allens) of why eDiscovery service providers can’t (or don’t) standardize hash values so as to support identification and deduplication across products and collections. Good question. Let’s take a look.

Norton Rose Fulbright’s New Annual Survey Shows More Cross-Border Discovery & Alternative Fee Arrangements: eDiscovery Trends

September 21, 2016

According to Norton Rose Fulbright’s Litigation Trends Annual Survey for 2016 released last week, eDiscovery is “increasingly painful and costly to manage, particularly considering the growth of cross-border discovery”. Interestingly, however, more respondents are now using alternative fee arrangements (AFAs) and in a higher proportion of the litigation work they carry out, with a whopping 97% satisfied with the work conducted under an AFA.