Mass Law Blog

Electronic Discovery and the New Federal Rules: What Every Lawyer Should Know

by | Dec 1, 2006

At long last, the highly anticipated amendments to the new federal rules of civil procedure are here. The federal court system has amended its rules of procedure to address electronic discovery, aka “e-discovery”. The amendments became effective on December 1, 2006.

Unfortunately, this news has been greeted with yawns from many attorneys who believe this is just another run-of-the-mill procedural change. Far from it; the e-discovery revolution represented by this rules change – and it is a revolution – is anything but ordinary, and the courts (which have been warming up to this issue for some time) have warned that its effects will be profound and far-reaching.

The rule changes themselves may not appear earth-shattering, but they change the standard for both lawyers and clients as it relates to the exchange and management of information in litigation. Since the federal court system has provided summaries of the changes (see rules 16, 26, 33, 34, 37 and 45), we won’t go into fine detail. However, there are a few changes worth highlighting, including the obligations placed on litigants and the courts to confront e-discovery at the outset of a case (see rules 16 and 26), the definitional changes designed to address “electronically stored information” (see rules 26 and 34), and the “safe harbor” exception which protects parties from sanctions if data is lost during the routine, good-faith operation of their computer system (see rule 37).

What is truly special about e-discovery, however, is not really the letter of the law. What all lawyers should know is that courts and the new federal rules have placed a significant part of the responsibility for the location, preservation and production of litigants’ electronic data on their attorneys. One need only review the following examples to get the picture:

  • Zubulake v. UBS Warburg LLC, (S.D.N.Y. July 20, 2004) – “Counsel must oversee compliance with the litigation hold, monitoring the party’s efforts to retain and produce the relevant documents. . . Once a ‘litigation hold’ is in place, a party and her counsel must make certain that all sources of potentially relevant information are identified and placed ‘on hold,’ . . . To do this, counsel must become fully familiar with her client’s document retention policies, as well as the client’s data retention architecture. This will invariably involve speaking with information technology personnel, who can explain system-wide backup procedures and the actual (as opposed to theoretical) implementation of the firm’s recycling policy. It will also involve communicating with the ‘key players’ in the litigation, in order to understand how they stored information. . . Once a party and her counsel have identified all of the sources of potentially relevant information, they are under a duty to retain that information . . . and to produce information responsive to the opposing party’s requests. . . . There are thus a number of steps that counsel should take to ensure compliance with the preservation obligation. While these precautions may not be enough (or may be too much) in some cases, they are designed to promote the continued preservation of potentially relevant information in the typical case. First, counsel must issue a ‘litigation hold’ at the outset of litigation or whenever litigation is reasonably anticipated. The litigation hold should be periodically re-issued so that new employees are aware of it, and so that it is fresh in the minds of all employees. Second, counsel should communicate directly with the ‘key players’ in the litigation, i.e., the people identified in a party’s initial disclosure and any subsequent supplementation thereto. Because these ‘key players’ are the ’employees likely to have relevant information’, it is particularly important that the preservation duty be communicated clearly to them. As with the litigation hold, the key players should be periodically reminded that the preservation duty is still in place. Finally, counsel should instruct all employees to produce electronic copies of their relevant active files. Counsel must also make sure that all backup media which the party is required to retain is identified and stored in a safe place.”
  • Heng Chan v. Triple 8 Palace, (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 11, 2005) – “The preservation obligation runs first to counsel, who has a duty to advise his client of the type of information potentially relevant to the lawsuit and of the necessity of preventing its destruction. . . Where the client is a business, its managers, in turn, are responsible for conveying to the employees the requirements for preserving evidence. . . Thus, once a party reasonably anticipates litigation, it must suspend its routine document retention/destruction policy and put in place a ‘litigation hold’ to ensure the preservation of relevant documents. When the failure to meet these obligations results in the destruction of evidence, sanctions are warranted. And, though the nature of the sanction depends in part on the state of mind of the destroyer, some remedy may be appropriate even where the destruction is merely negligent.”

Until now, issues related to document preservation fell squarely on the client who, after all, typically has exclusive control over their own documents and information. For various reasons, including the dynamic nature of electronic data and modern computer systems as well as several high-profile e-discovery catastrophes involving large corporations, the courts are now are placing affirmative and stringent obligations on attorneys. And in-house attorneys should note that these obligations do not end with outside litigation counsel but expressly include in-house counsel and appear to reach any attorney who advises their clients about litigation or document retention.

The new federal rules require attorneys to confer about their clients’ electronic data and make “electronically stored information” completely discoverable. Therefore, the amended federal rules now require lawyers to investigate and understand their client’s computer systems and data and ensure that the relevant data is preserved and then produced in accordance with their discovery obligations. Gone are the days when lawyers could tell a federal judge that they don’t understand all of this technical computer stuff.

While these e-discovery obligations must be taken seriously, there is no reason to feel overwhelmed. In fact, if you’ve read this far then you should already be able to identify many of the key issues and pitfalls. Moreover, today there are numerous legal decisions highlighting the mistakes of others from which we can all learn a tremendous amount. There is also available a wealth of publications, vendors and other resources focusing on e-discovery. These resources – which were practically nonexistent just 3-4 years ago – now make it possible for lawyers, including the non-specialist, to understand and keep up with this evolving issue.