Electronic Discovery and Computer Forensics Case List - Kroll Ontrack

limitations on the inspection of Southern Diagnostic’s computer system and make no account that
the computer system contained confidential and privileged information. The appellate court
directed the trial court to craft a narrowly tailored order that accomplishes the purposes of the
discovery requests and provides for confidentiality.
� Bowe v. State, 785 So.2d 531 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 2001). “An e-mail ‘statement’ sent to another is
always subject to the limitations of the hearsay rule.”
� Strasser v. Yalamanchi, 669 So.2d 1142 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 1996). The court ruled that the trial
court’s discovery order should be quashed because (1) unrestricted access to the defendant’s
entire computer system was overly broad and would pose a threat to confidential records and (2)
there was little evidence that the purged documents could be retrieved.
� Carbon Dioxide Indus. Antitrust Litig., 155 F.R.D. 209 (M.D. Fla. 1993). “[D]epositions to
identify how data is maintained and to determine what hardware and software is necessary to
access the information are preliminary depositions necessary to proceed with merits discovery.”
Georgia
� Stanfill v. Talton, 2012 WL 1035385 (M.D.Ga. Mar. 29, 2012). In this discovery dispute, the
plaintiff sought an adverse inference sanction stemming from the defendants detention center’s
failure to preserve video recordings relevant to plaintiff’s allegations of excessive force resulting in
the death of an inmate. The defendants contended that their conduct—failing to make copies of
video recordings before the recordings were automatically overwritten (ordinarily a two to three
month window)—was not sanctionable. They argued that they could not have reasonably
anticipated litigation at the time of deletion. Alternatively, the defendants argued that they lacked
requisite bad faith culpability. Applying federal law, the court reasoned that while the excessive
force incident was immediately subject to independent review by the state investigation bureau,
that alone was not enough to trigger a duty to preserve the tapes for a claim filed over two years
after the death of the inmate. Further, the court found that even if the defendants owed a duty to
preserve to this particular plaintiff, the defendants’ failure to copy the video recordings only
amounted to negligence. Therefore, there was insufficient evidence to warrant an adverse
inference sanction.
� In re Delta/AirTran Baggage Fee Antitrust Litig., 2012 WL 360509 (N.D. Ga. Feb. 3, 2012). In
this antitrust case, the plaintiffs moved for sanctions for the defendant’s alleged failure to make a
reasonable inquiry before certifying responses to discovery requests. Despite the defense
counsel’s repeated, “forceful” assurances that they had fully complied with production requests, the
defendant discovered and produced 60,000 pages of missing responsive documents. The
documents were located in backup tapes found in an evidence locker controlled by IT and hard
drives that were not uploaded into the defendant’s search platform. Although the defendant
remedied its mistake and the data sources were devoid of any “smoking gun” documents, the court
found that the defendant’s lackluster communication with IT, empty reassurances of a seamless
production and failure to correct false statements fell short of the certification requirements under
Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(g). The court also noted that the defendant’s late discovery was sanctionable
under Fed.R.Civ.P. 37(c)(1) and Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(e) (collectively requiring timely supplementation).
The court cited the same general lack of diligence by the defendant and awarded reasonable
attorney fees resulting from the delay.
� Sitton v. Print Direction, Inc., 2011 WL 4469712 (Ga. App. Sept. 28, 2011). In this privacy rights
dispute, the plaintiff appealed the trial court’s determination that the defendant-employer’s
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