Author Archive: Charles Skamser

eDiscovery Law

• No Sanctions For Failure to Preserve Where Deleted Call Recordings "would not have been supportive of Plaintiff's claim" June 13, 2013
  Cottle-Banks v. Cox Commc'ns, Inc., No. 10cv2133-GPC (WVG), 2013 WL 2244333 (S.D. Cal. May 21, 2013) In this putative class action, Plaintiff sought sanctions for Defendant’s failure to preserve potentially relevant customer call recordings.  Although the court found that Defendant was negligent in its failure to preserve (and thus had the requisite “cu […]
  K&L Gates
• Special Master Analyzes Privilege Search Terms, Addresses Objection that they were Overbroad June 6, 2013
  Dornoch Holdings Int’l, LLC v. Conagra Foods Lamb Weston, Inc., No. 1:10-cv-00135 TJH, 2013 WL 2384235 (D. Idaho May 1, 2013) In this case, a Special Master was directed to obtain ESI (more than one million documents) from a bankruptcy trustee, to review it for privilege, and to prepare a privilege log. The documents were screened utilizing keyword search te […]
  K&L Gates
• Opinion Highlights Questions Surrounding Proper Predictive Coding Protocols June 3, 2013
  Gordon v. Kaleida Health, No. 08-CV-378S(F), 2013 WL 2250579 (W.D.N.Y. May 21, 2013) In this case, the court considered Plaintiffs’ motion “to compel Defendants to meet and confer with respect to establishing an agreed protocol for implementing the use of predictive coding software” and for an order that if the parties could not agree on an ESI protocol, tha […]
  K&L Gates
• Court Orders Adverse Inference for Failure to Prevent Automatic Deletion May 30, 2013
  Pillay v. Millard Refrigerated Servs., Inc., No. 09 C 5725, 2013 WL 2251727 (N.D. Ill. May 22, 2013) In this case, the court granted Plaintiff’s motion for an adverse inference instruction where Defendant failed to prevent the automatic deletion of relevant data despite notice of impending litigation and receipt of a specific preservation notice, sent direct […]
  K&L Gates
• U.S. International Trade Commission Adopts e-Discovery Rules May 23, 2013
  The U.S. International Trade Commission has adopted “final rules related to its e-discovery practices.”  “The new rules will be effective 30 days after publication in the Federal Register and are applicable to investigations instituted 30 days after publication in the Federal Register”—a Federal Register notice was issued on May 15, 2013. The newly adopted r […]
  K&L Gates
• Case Update: For Spoliation, Court Orders $250,000,000 "to be applied as a credit against Rambus's [$349 million] judgment against SK hynix" May 22, 2013
  SK Hynix, Inc. v. Rambus, Inc., No. C-00-20905 RMW, 2013 WL 1915865 (N.D. Cal. May 8, 2013) In this ongoing patent infringement action, a major question has been whether Rambus’s destruction of documents constituted spoliation and, if so, what sanctions should be imposed. Different courts considering the same facts (but involving different plaintiffs) came t […]
  K&L Gates
• For Good Cause Shown, Plaintiffs No Longer Required to Utilize Predictive Coding May 17, 2013
  EORHB, Inc. v. HOA Holdings, LLC, No. 7409-VCL, 2013 WL 1960621 (Del. Ch. May 6, 2013) Previously, the court ordered the parties to “retain a single discovery vendor to be used by both sides” and to “conduct document review with the assistance of predictive coding.”  (See summary, here.)  On May 6, the court entered a new order, stating that Defendants could […]
  K&L Gates
• Upcoming Event: eDiscovery Project Management 2013 (organized by eDiscovery Intelligence) May 7, 2013
  “Learn how to Bring Agility and Clarity to the Management of your eDiscovery Process” May 21-22, 2013 Marriot City Center Pittsburgh, PA “The mastery of electronic discovery is a necessary component in the changing business of litigation.  The tools for the seamless management of e discovery workflow are imperative for success.  This is not a vendor-led disc […]
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• Fourth Circuit Addresses Taxable Costs Related to ESI May 3, 2013
  Country Vintner of North Carolina, LLC v. E & J Gallo Winery, Inc., ---F. 3d.---, 2013 WL 1789728 (4th Cir. Apr. 29, 2013) In this case, the Fourth Circuit clarified “what expenses related to electronically stored information (“ESI”) are taxable under the federal taxation-of-costs statute as '[f]ees for exemplification and the costs of making copies […]
  K&L Gates
• Citing Proportionality, Court Declines to Require Defendant to Redo Discovery Utilizing Only Predictive Coding April 23, 2013
  In re: Biomet M2a Magnum Hip Implant Prods. Liab. Litig., NO. 3:12-MD-2391 (N.D. Ind. Apr. 18, 2013) In this product liability case, Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee objected to Biomet’s reliance on keyword searching to initially reduce the volume of information it then subjected to predictive coding and sought to require Biomet to start again and to utilize o […]
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