Arbitrator Accuses E-Discovery Firm of Failing to Turn Up Its Own Evidence

Here is an interesting article, from the ABA Journal’s Law News Now. By Debra Cassens Weiss.

An arbitrator has awarded a former employee of an e-discovery firm $300,000 after chastising her one-time employer for failing to turn up e-mails that supported her case.

Cassondra Todd, the former managing director of Guidance Software Inc., claimed the company fired her in part because she was a woman. An initial round of e-discovery produced little evidence, but then Todd located some relevant e-mails that had been saved by a former manager, now the head of a rival company, the Associated Press reports.

“At the very least, the case shows how thorny electronic evidence searches can be, even for a specialist,” the AP story says.

One of the e-mails in the files of the former manager, Tim Leehealey, questioned whether someone in the company was setting Todd up to be fired, the AP story says. “She was a good employee and produced for me,” he said in the e-mail.

After the extra e-mails were fond in Leehealey’s files, the retired judge arbitrating the case, William McDonald, ordered another round of e-discovery. But the company came back with nothing, except for the news that one of its backup tapes for e-mail had been corrupted, the story says. “I want this game-playing stopped,” McDonald said.

Victor Limongelli, Guidance’s new chief executive, told AP he doesn’t know why the company failed to find the e-mails, but did say a lost laptop was the reason for one oversight. He also said the company was not required to search backup tapes in the early stages of discovery because of the expense. “We think we followed what is a quite normal course,” he told AP.