Legal Commentary

Mistakes Will Be Made: U.S. Magistrate Judge James Francis IV, of the U.S. District Court, Southern District, New York, has issued an electronic data discovery ruling that is already the talk of the EDD community.

In the  November 19 ruling in Orbit One v. Numerex, Francis held that an "executive's purging of information from acquired corporation's server did not merit adverse inference instruction based on spoliation," and "executives removal of acquired corporation's laptop hard drive did not merit adverse inference instruction."

Says Anne Kershaw, president of New York's eDiscovery Institute: "It is the first decision that says, basically, 'reasonable' in discovery includes an expectation that mistakes will be made;  the issue is whether the mistakes matter. He also says flat out that he disagrees with the Pension Committee case," referring to U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin's controversial January opinion (also S.D.N.Y.) 

More: K&L|Gates Electronic Discovery Law blog. Includes link to opinion via Westlaw.

P.S. LTN's e-discovery columnist Craig Ball, and Cecil Lynn, who writes LTN's annual summary of key EDD cases, will discuss Orbit One and other key 2010 rulings, on Virtual LegalTech, December 14 at 3:45 pm. EST. 

Update: Ralph Losey's post here. (Hat tip: John Waid)