Court nixes spoliation as a tort; California's Supreme Court recently ruled that sanctions available in the underlying case obviate the need for a separate tort
Article Abstract:
The California Supreme Court in Cedars-Sinai Medical Center v. Superior Court rejected two 1980s and 1990s California lower court decisions recognizing the tort of spoliation of evidence. This ruling is important both for its detailed analysis of the issue and because the cases it disagreed with had been relied on in other jurisdictions that recognized the tort of intentional spoliation. The Cedars-Sinai ruling was a medical malpractice case in which the plaintiff alleged that the hospital had intentionally destroyed records to prevent the plaintiff prevailing.
Publication Name: The National Law Journal
Subject: Law
ISSN: 0162-7325
Year: 1998
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Document spoliation claims require timely investigation; a litigant must prove both that material documents existed and that an opponent destroyed or failed to produce them
Article Abstract:
Courts are generally unwilling to find spoliation without strong proof, so such a claim demands thorough preparation rather than being made as a last- minute addition. The former existence of the documents, their probative value, and their destruction or deliberate failure to produce them must all be proven to sustain a spoliation claim, though success can be worthwhile. To survive a spoliation challenge, a company's document-destruction policies must be well established and consistent, ignoring a document's substance.
Publication Name: The National Law Journal
Subject: Law
ISSN: 0162-7325
Year: 1996
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Managing evidence isn't easy; using technology with vision is the key
Article Abstract:
Lawyers wishing to automate evidence management must plan for that automation with a clear vision of what they want to accomplish. Questions which must be addressed in planning include the number of users who will need to access the system at the same time, proper administrative support, and proper coding of documents to facilitate speedy retrieval. Lawyers with many documents may be best served by large, stand-alone systems, but these have the disadvantage that only one person can access them at a time.
Publication Name: The National Law Journal
Subject: Law
ISSN: 0162-7325
Year: 1993
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