On Sep 24, 12:06 pm, "ctops.legal" <ctops.le..._at_gmail.com> wrote:
> "Spoliation" is the "intentional destruction, mutilation, alteration,
> or concealment of evidence." BLACKS LAW DICTIONARY 1437 (8th Ed.
> 2004). Federal law, not state law, controls the imposition of
> sanctions for failure to preserve evidence in a diversity case. See
> Flury v. Daimler Chrysler Corp., 427 F.3d 939 (11th Cir. 2005)
> (federal law governs the imposition of spoliation sanctions), cert.
> denied, 126 S. Ct. 2967, 165 L. Ed. 2d 950 (2006); [*22] see also
> King v. Illinois Central R.R. Co. 337 F.3d 550, 556 (5th Cir. 2003)
> (same); Assimack v. J.C. Penney Corp., 2005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 20463,
> 2005 WL 2219422, *2 (M.D. Fla.. 2005) (same) The Court has broad
> discretion to impose sanctions derived from its inherent power to
> manage its own affairs and to achieve the orderly and expeditious
> disposition of cases. Id. at 944 (citing Chambers, 501 U.S. 32 at 43,
> 111 S. Ct. 2123, 115 L. Ed. 2d 27 (1991)). Sanctions for discovery
> abuses are intended to prevent unfair prejudice to litigants and to
> insure the integrity of the discovery process. Id. The courts have the
> inherent power to enter a default judgment as punishment for a
> defendant's destruction of documents:
> Sanctions may be imposed against a litigant who is on notice that
> documents and information in its possession are relevant to
> litigation, or potential litigation, or are reasonably calculated to
> lead to the discovery of admissible evidence, and destroys such
> documents and information. While a litigant is under no duty to keep
> or retain every document in its possession once a complaint is filed,
> it is under a duty to preserve what it knows, or reasonably should
> know, is relevant in the [*23] action, is reasonably calculated to
> lead to the discovery of admissible evidence, is reasonably likely to
> be requested during discovery, and/or is the subject of a pending
> discovery request.
Fundamentally, there has to be documentation on the chain of custody
for the tapes, otherwise you can't really. IMHO, you have a
"physical" handling of the tapes case to prove, not a technical-sleuth
case.
Received on Mon Sep 24 2007 - 12:37:32 CDT
