Every week, the Array team reviews the latest news and analysis about the evolving field of eDiscovery to bring you the topics and trends you need to know. This week’s post covers the period of August 31-September 6.
Here’s what’s happening.
On eDiscovery Today, Doug Austin writes about the case In re Sandisk SSDs Litig., where California Magistrate Judge Lisa L. Cisneros granted the plaintiffs’ motion to reopen three depositions of the defendants’ employees, a decision that illustrates the potential consequences of producing documents after witnesses relevant to those documents are deposed.
In this case, the defendants withdrew privilege designations to the vast majority of disputed documents, and then produced those documents after the relevant witnesses were deposed. As Judge Cisneros wrote, the defendants disputed whether the documents at issue included sufficient relevant information to warrant reopening depositions of the particular employees. But Judge Cisneros wrote that because the defendants “brought this situation on themselves by withholding documents from production without sufficient cause, the Court is not inclined to second guess Plaintiffs’ assessment of the potential relevance of the documents.”
In her decision, Judge Cisneros referenced Rule 30 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which says the court “must allow additional time [for depositions] consistent with Rule 26(b)(1) and (2) if needed to fairly examine the deponent or if the deponent, another person, or any other circumstance impedes or delays the examination.” Judge Cisneros said the defendants impeded these examinations by failing to produce documents subject to discovery prior to the depositions.
Not all was lost for the defendants. While Judge Cisneros reopened the three depositions, she limited questioning to issues pertaining to documents produced after the original deposition, testimony from other witnesses’ reopened depositions, and reasonable follow-up questions. “This Order is intended to redress Defendants’ previous failure to produce documents, not to grant Plaintiffs a complete do-over of previous depositions,” she wrote.
Other recent eDiscovery news and headlines:
