[RPPTL-constructionlaw] [RPPTL-construction law] E - D I S C OV E R Y starts September 1....

Fri Aug 17 07:07:23 PDT 2012

CLC Gang:  I smell a new CLC subcommittee with Michael being its Chair.  Does anyone disagree?  

Also, who else in the CLC would like to serve on this new subcommittee?  Seems like a great opportunity for folks to get involved? 

Please respond to directly to me at Arnold.Tritt at atritt.com (and not the ListServ).  

Thanks, Arnie.

From: constructionlaw-bounces at lists.flabarrpptl.org [mailto:constructionlaw-bounces at lists.flabarrpptl.org] On Behalf Of mromm at rommlaw.com
Sent: Friday, August 17, 2012 1:19 AM
To: RPPTL constructionlaw
Subject: Re: [RPPTL-constructionlaw] [RPPTL-construction law] E - D I S C OV E R Y starts September 1....

Fellow Members:   I recently read in an ACEDS article about the following:   Did you know that there is a law firm in California that is now being sued for malpractice due to an E-Discovery screw up?   The case involves allegations that J-M Manufacturing Co., of Los Angeles, through its former lawyers at McDermott Will & Emery and e-discovery service providers, Navigant and Stratify, repeatedly disclosed nearly 4,000 privileged documents to adversaries and the US government in a federal False Claims Act lawsuit. Who thinks that under 502 these inadvertant disclosures will be recovered by the Clawback Rule?    Judge Wu issued an opinion which is attached. 

This case led me to thinking about Florida's new E-Discovery Rules:

Florida's new E-Discovery Rules take effect on September 1, 2012.  I know of several larger law firms that have already assembled their E-Discovery Committees, developed internal practices and procedures, created E-Discovery Compliance Checklists, E-discovery litigation forms for use in litigation, fine tuned their litigation hold letters; and they have already retained or interviewed third party vendors.  In the case of the smaller firms, such as my solo law practice, I have also convened an E-Discovery Committee, but mine is a committee of 1 (me). 

I am sure there are a number of CLC Members who have a similarly sized law firm.    I met with myself and voted unanimously to create internal practices and procedures to comply with the new E-Discovery Rules, create compliance checklists and E-Discovery litigation forms, etc.  However, I would welcome and appreciate the benefit of any firm that has prepared any documentation related to E-Discovery that they might be willing to share with our committee.  For example:  

1.    Litigation hold letter forms (to our own clients and a different form to the opposing party).

2.    E-Discovery compliance Checklist

3.    E-Discovery Compliance Forms such as:

        A.   a  new form for a  Request for Production of Documents that specifically addresses the following:

(a)    emails

(b)    duplication

(c)    de-duplication

(d)    Twitter

(e)    Facebook

(f)     PDA's , I-Phones, I-Pads, Cell-Phones, Blackberry's; PDA's (federal and state courts have already ruled                these are all fair game);

(g)    production format?  with or without source and header information? metadata, etc.

(h)    Text Messages

(i)     Etc.

Because emails and text messages are so easy to use and expedite communications, people tend to be less formal about what they say in an email or a text. If you think discovery concerning this type of communication is not crucial, just ask any one of the 85,000 people employed worldwide at the prestigious accounting firm of Arthur Andersen!  OOOps.  You can't ask them!  They all lost their jobs!  As discussed in a recent Florida Bar Journal article:  "The classic example is Arthur Andersen's shredding of Enron-related documents. Several e-mails by Andersen's employees candidly remarked and joked about the shredding of thousands of crucial auditing materials. The result: Those e-mails surfaced, and today Andersen no longer exists".

 Thanks in advance to anyone who contributes!.  Michael Romm

Michael Romm

Michael R. Romm, P.A.

1213 S. 30th Avenue, Suite 2, Hollywood, FL 33020

Phone: (954) 557-8002

Fax:  (954) 208-0022

mromm at rommlaw.com

Arnold D. Tritt, Jr.
Board Certified Construction Attorney

707 Peninsular Place
Jacksonville, Florida 32204
Phone (904) 354-5200
Facsimile (904) 354-5256
Arnold.Tritt at atritt.com
www.atritt.com

CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: The information and all attachments contained in this electronic communication are legally privileged and confidential information, subject to the attorney-client privilege and intended only for the use of intended recipients .  If the reader of this message is not an intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, use, dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited .   If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately of the error by return email and please permanently remove any copies of this message from your system and do not retain any copies, whether in electronic or physical form or otherwise .  Unauthorized interception of this e-mail is a violation of federal criminal law.

TAX ADVICE DISCLOSURE: Pursuant to the requirements of Internal Revenue Service Circular 230, we advise you that any federal tax advice contained in this communication (including any attachments) is not intended or written to be used, and cannot be used, for the purpose of: (1) avoiding penalties that maybe imposed under the Internal Revenue Code or (2) promoting, marketing or recommending to another party any transaction or matter addressed in this communication.

Disclaimer regarding Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (“UETA”) (Florida Statutes Section 668.50): If this communication concerns negotiation of a contract or agreement, UETA does not apply to this communication; contract formation in this matter shall occur only with manually-affixed original signatures on original documents.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/constructionlaw/attachments/20120817/81e31173/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: trittrendziologo_cmykcropped.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 18814 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/constructionlaw/attachments/20120817/81e31173/trittrendziologo_cmykcropped.jpg>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image006.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 3857 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/constructionlaw/attachments/20120817/81e31173/image006.jpg>