All About Information

In a June 16th order, Master MacLeod had the opportunity to consider whether a party should be compelled to answer, in the ordinary course of oral discovery, questions about its efforts to preserve evidence. He said:

Q. 823 was originally a question about producing pharmacy records. Apparently when the request was made, the pharmacy only had computer records going back to 2001. There was a follow up question as to when the request was made. Q. 945 asked for a microbiological report which is not available. The question is asked as to whether the document did exist and if it was destroyed, when that occurred and when did the plaintiffs first take steps to preserve the evidence? These follow up questions, if they are relevant, are relevant only to an argument that an adverse inference at trial should be drawn if it appears the plaintiffs did not take adequate steps to preserve available evidence once litigation was contemplated or when it first became apparent that this evidence might be relevant. There are certainly circumstances in which compliance with litigation holds or compliance with undertakings may make it relevant if a party has been so slow in complying with its obligations as to give rise to a spoliation inference or sanctions for what in the United States is sometimes described as “purposeful sluggishness”. There is no evidence before me to suggest this is the case here and I decline to exercise my discretion by ordering this question to be answered.

Andersen v. St. Jude Medical Inc., [2008] O.J. 2452 (S.C.J.) (QL).

On June 11th, the Alberta Court of Appeal held that a judge erred in ordering the production of hard drive images that contained patient files.

The case is about a public health authority’s right to audit files held by one of its former service providers, and in particular, its right of access to files of patients whose treatment the authority only partly funded. These patients also received privately-funded services, but only had one patient record with the service provider, which raised an issue about the authority’s right to look at the files in the course of an audit. This issue was initially litigated up to the Alberta Court of Appeal in 2006.  The Court of Appeal held that the authority had no right of access to the “hybrid files” under public law, but did not consider the authority’s contractual right of audit.

The access dispute was revived again when the service provider sued the authority for unlawfully seeking access to the hybrid files and forcing it to defend its clients’ privacy rights through litigation.  Several computer hard drives containing hybrid files that were imaged in the original dispute and stored at the court were central to the action.  The authority revived its attempt at accessing the hybrid files by filing a counterclaim in which it alleged breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty. It made a vague allegation in its pleadings that the service provider was double-billing, but did not plead fraud.  (It had no evidence of fraud because any such evidence could only be revealed on an examination of the hybrid files themselves.)

A case management judge ordered the hard drives to be produced to the authority in specie (in their actual form) with a direction not to print or take notes of anything irrelevant and in reliance of the no collateral use rule embedded in the implied undertaking.  The Court of Appeal held this order was made in error and that the authority’s vague pleadings of fraud did not give it a right to the hybrid files.

The Court of Appeal’s judgement (written by Madam Justice Conrad) contains some very principled statements on e-discovery.  She held that a party to litigation will not ordinarily get access to a hard drive, which is simply a receptacle for information.  This is not new, but Madam Justice Conrad also suggested that a judge has a duty to protect irrelevant, confidential and private materials in the event of a production dispute.  She also stressed that orders to inspect a hard drive will only be made on “strong evidence” that a party is attempting to thwart the discovery process and, further, that a court that orders inspection of a hard drive should still ensure that irrelevant and confidential information is protected.  Referring to the order made in 2007 by the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench in Spar Aerospace (subsequently upheld on appeal), she said:

While I agree with Madam Justice Veit’s decision, I would add a caveat. Even in circumstances where it is clear that a litigant is thwarting the litigation process, and the court deems it appropriate to order production of a hard drive, measures should be taken to protect disclosure of irrelevant and immaterial information which the producing party objects to produce. Although litigation confidentiality exists, many times that will not be sufficient to protect personal, confidential and private material. A judge should always hear representations as to how information that is neither material nor relevant can be protected from exposure, and frame any production order in the least intrusive manner.

Madam Justice Conrad then held that there was no basis justifying an inspection order in the circumstances, that the service provider’s pleading did not put the entire content of the hard drives at issue and that concerns about the cost of separating the records on the hard drive were not established or were at least premature.

The Court also held that the action did not give the authority a right of disclosure that extended to the hybrid files.  It held that the dispute was about the scope of a contractual right of audit and not an allegation of fraud despite the vague allegations pleaded in authority’s counter claim.  It seemed clear to the Court that the authority was attempting to seek what it ultimately wanted (a look at the hybrid files) by the way in which it pleaded its counterclaim.  Madam Justice Conrad said the authority was on a “fishing expedition.”

While an obviously significant e-discovery case, this also says something about records management, the need for third-party access and potential conflicts with personal privacy rights.  If the authority’s funding contract demanded that patient records for funded services be separately maintained, this dispute might have been avoided.

Innovative Health Group v. Calgary Health Region, 2008 ABCA 219 (CanLII).

On June 30th of this month, the bulk of the Bill 107 amendments to the Ontario Human Rights Code will come into effect and the Ontario system for resolving human rights matters will start allowing for “direct access” to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal. This week, the Tribunal issued Rules of Procedure for “new applications” - those applications filed after June 30th and applications involving complaints that are currently outstanding at the Commission and that are re-filed as applications after years’ end.

The plain language guide published with the Rules states, “The Tribunal’s goal is to have the hearing completed within one year of receiving a completed application form.” In light of this aggressive goal, I thought it worth a quick summary of the disclosure and production framework contemplated by the rules, which starts up-front during the pleadings stage.

Here’s an overview of what is contemplated:

• The Application form and the Response form ask the parties to identify (with reasons) “important” documents they, other parties and any third parties posses. The use of the word “important” is significant, and signals an appreciation for proportionality.
• The Application form and the Response form ask for witnesses names and a short description of why each listed witness is “important.” The identities of potential witnesses are collected by the Tribunal up-front, but are not disclosed between the parties until shortly before a hearing. This indicates that the parties’ witness lists will initially be used for case management purposes.
• The Tribunal also has a unique power of inquiry. At the request of a party it may order an inquiry where an inquiry is “required” in order to obtain evidence, the evidence “may assist in achieving a fair, just and expeditious resolution of the merits of the application” and ordering an inquiry is “appropriate.” When the Tribunal orders an inquiry it will authorize a person to conduct the inquiry and prepare of written report in accordance with terms of reference. The person conducting the inquiry will have a broad power to gather evidence in making a report, including the power to enter premises without a warrant, to request the production of documents and things, to question witnesses, to demand production of electronically stored information and to take photographs and video recordings. The Tribunal will not ordinarily treat the report as evidence unless the parties consent or unless the author of the report testifies. The Rules establish a preference for inquires to take place early in the process: “[A request for an inquiry] must be made promptly after the party becomes aware of the need for an inquiry.”
• After the Tribunal confirms the hearing, the parties will have 21 days to deliver and file a list of all “arguably relevant” documents in their possession, including documents over which privilege is claimed. Parties must produce copies of non-privileged documents together with their lists. The Rules do not make any mention of electronic production.
• The next significant date is 45 days before the first scheduled date of hearing. At this point the parties must exchange and file the following: (1) a list of documents on which they indend to rely; (2) a witness list along with will-say statements; and (3) any expert witness reports or, alternatively, a “full” summary of an expert witness’s evidence. Parties will ordinarily be precluded from relying on documents and witnesses not disclosed in accordance with this requirement.

There is no process for oral discovery (which would be atypical in an administrative procedure) but the Tribunal is offering voluntary mediation, an additional means for the parties and the Tribunal to glean the other sides’ potential evidence and assess the case. In fact, the Tribunal’s plain language guide states that it will use mediation to assess and manage matters that do not settle.

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice issued an order setting aside an Anton Piller order on April 8^th. The judgement is another stressing the extreme burden on parties who seek such orders.

The Anton Piller was initially granted in 2006 in support of a departing employee claim that included allegations of fraud and breach of confidence. The Court it aside because the plaintiff failed to fully and frankly disclose material facts and failed to make reasonable inquiries into material facts. More specifically, it held the plaintiff:

• failed to ask customers whose business it claimed was lost or threatened due to the individual defendant’s actions whether they had been approached by the individual defendant;
• failed to disclose that a customer relationship on which it relied was responsible for only a 2% portion of its gross profit; and
• despite raising the difficulty in seeking production of the individual defendant’s MS Hotmail (which resided in the United States), failed to disclose that it had launched an action in Texas against the individual defendant’s new employer concurrently with its Ontario action, that it had sent a preservation letter to the new employer in conjunction with the action and that it had an agreement from Microsoft to retain the individual defendant’s MS Hotmail e-mails indefinitely.

The Court also criticized the execution of the order and, in particular, a search conducted of the purse of the individual defendant’s wife (also named). The Court said:

[The plaintiffs] were authorized to search for paper documents and electronic data related to Factor’s business, the business of Lanxess and Jean’s potential use of documents from Factor to promote his own and Bigler’s business interests. I question whether any of this material was reasonably likely to be found in Margaret Jean’s purse.

Also interesting, though it was neither challenged nor part of the Court’s consideration: the plaintiff discovered significant evidence of wrongdoing and determined the relevance of the individual defendant’s MS Hotmail account by installing spyware on his computer while he was employed.

Factor Gas Liquids Inc. v. Jean, 2008 CanLII 15900 (ON S.C.).

On January 18th, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice dismissed a motion requesting that a defendant to a wrongful dismissal claim image all computers, mobile handheld devices and other electronic devices for inspection because it had produced an attachment to a single e-mail without the lead e-mail itself.  The defendant claimed the lead e-mail was blank (containing only the attachment) and had long-since been destroyed.  The Court ordered the defendant to use its best efforts to locate the lead e-mail and dismissed the requested order as speculative.

Ritchie v. 830234 Ontario Inc. (Richelieu Hardware Canada Ltd.), 2008 CanLII 4787 (ON S.C.). 

On January 21st, Master MacLeod of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice issued an order which allowed the parties to a complex e-discovery to proceed. He cited the Sedona Canada Principles and issued a limited order after considering the potential costs and the impact on individual privacy rights that would be associated with a definitive order for more fulsome production.

In litigating a class action claiming product liability damages caused by a heart valve, the plaintiffs brought a motion to challenge the defendants’ production of (1) two clinical trials databases which included adverse events data, (2) questionnaires used to collect adverse event data and (3) a data entry database associated with the adverse events databases. The two clinical trials databases were maintained by the University of Pittsburgh (a non-party) pursuant to a research agreement. Likewise, the questionnaires were held by clinicians thoughout the world pursuant to research agreements. The defendants’ legal rights to the data entry database (called “POP”) were less clear, a significant complication given the University’s residence in a foreign jurisdiction.

There was no dispute that 28 “freezes” of the adverse events databases (representing data stores at a point in time) included highly relevant information, but the plaintiffs claimed that the defendants’ production effort was too slow and that the defendants’ manner of production did not allow them to assess the data’s validity. One of the defendants’ key objections: the University had redacted patient initials and birth-dates from the production. The University did not adduce evidence on the motion, but the defendants argued on the University’s behalf that it would be exposed to liability and a potential breach of U. S. federal or state privacy legislation if it provided the data in unredacted form. The defendants also raised the costs the University was bearing and would additionally bear if further, more fulsome production was to be ordered.

Master MacLeod considered the competing demands and said that the production “solution” should meet four criteria. He said:

• The data produced to the plaintiffs must be substantially the same data as that which has been reviewed by the defendants’ own experts. If not then the plaintiff and defendant experts are being asked to draw conclusions based on different information.
• The forensic continuity of the data must be demonstrable such that any issues about authenticity or accuracy can be readily answered.
• The process of redaction must not leave the data less meaningful or useful. While the exact birth-dates and initials of the patients may not be necessary to analysis of data, it will for example be critical that data attributable to specific patients can still be tracked and where there are associated slides or tissue samples or other medical records produced in the litigation this can be matched to the data in the same way as previous to the redaction.
• The process of redaction must not unduly delay production.

Master MacLeod held that the current manner of production did not meet the criteria. In particular, he took exception to the fact that the defendants’ experts were apparently working with original and unredacted data, which he said could put the plaintiffs at a disadvantage. The defendants’ use of unredacted information may also have led him to conclude that patient privacy, while warranting protection, may ultimately need to yield to “the imperative of justice.”

Master MacLeod’s order was limited in that it merely established a process and criteria to allow the e-discovery to proceed. The key part of the order, for example, read:

In the event the data cannot be produced in redacted form in a timely fashion or if the redactions can be shown to compromise the integrity of the data or if the redacted data is significantly different than the data available to the defence experts, the plaintiff expert is to be given access to complete and accurate copies of the 28 data freezes as well as a current set of data.

There are other aspects of the order that are of significance. For example, Master MacLeod reasoned that the POP database (being potentially controlled by a non-resident) was analogous to deleted or residual electronically stored information as that term is used in Sedona Canada Principle 6. He said, “Only if [the plaintiffs] cannot answer the questions accurately and there remain important unexplained anomalies in the AVERT data should it be necessary to consider production of the POP database.”

For more on the Sedona Conference’s Sedona Canada Principles and for a summary of Master MacLeod’s 2006 order in this same case, see the LexUM E-Discovery Canada website.

Andersen v. St. Jude Medical Inc., [2008] O.J. No. 430 (QL) (S.C.J.).

Norwich Pharmacal orders, also called “equitable bills of discovery,” enable a person to conduct pre-action discovery against a third-party who is likely to have important information about a bona fide wrongdoing. The development of the Canadian standard for these and similar third-party orders is of high relevance today because they are a potential means of investigating and pursuing claims based on anonymous internet use.

On February 12th, the Alberta Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal arguing for a Norwich Pharmacal order brought by an organization that had sued its former chief executive officer for fraud and sought information from the bank accounts of various third-parties (presumably to whom payments were made).

The judgement is not particularly principled. The Court ultimately dismissed the appeal because the appellant had not proven the order was necessary, but did not opine in detail on the standard of proof. It did, however, say this about the “innocent bystander” requirement:

While the party sought to be discovered must be more than a mere witness or bystander to the wrongdoing, it is not necessary that the party be, or be suspected to be, guilty of or privy to “wrongdoing” before a Norwich order is granted against it. The reality is that commercial and financial frauds, not to mention, breaches of trust and fiduciary duty, not infrequently involve the use of innocent parties such as financial institutions. Whether a wrongdoer uses a financial institution for the purpose of laundering money, impeding efforts to trace monies secured in breach of trust or through fraud, receiving secret payments in return for improper actions or simply as a vehicle in which to park ill-gotten gains does not really matter. If the reach of the Norwich order only applied to those complicit in a wrongdoer’s actions, then a wrongdoer could easily cover up financial misdeeds by the simple expedient of using innocent financial institutions. Thus, we do not agree that financial institutions used by alleged wrongdoers are necessarily “mere witnesses” who cannot be the subject of a Norwich order. However, if there is to be a Norwich order against third parties, there must be a bona fide claim of wrongdoing to which the third parties are somehow connected, innocently or otherwise.

The leading case in Canada remains the Federal Court of Appeal’s 2005 decision in BMG Canada Inc. v. Doe, an intellectual property infringement case in which the Court detailed the factors to be considered in balancing the public interest in the effective administration of justice against individual privacy rights.

A. B. v. C. D., 2008 ABCA 51 (CanLII).

On January 29th the New Brunswick Court of Queen’s Bench dismissed a contempt motion and a request for sanctions in a protracted discovery dispute.

Based on an earlier motion, decided on July 16, 2006, the defendants were ordered to provide a further and better affidavit of documents and to provide direct access to a computer system (including active and archived data). They did not provide such access and were sluggish in disclosing documents. The plaintiffs then brought a second motion in June 2007, asking the Court to infer malfeasance from the sluggishness and the fact that the defendants had continued to disclose documents after certifying earlier that they did not exist.

The plaintiffs’ motion was initially heard in June but concluded in late December. While the Court remained seized of the motion, in late November and December, the defendants provided two further and better affidavits and provided access to the computer system as previously ordered (without a cost-shifting order as they had requested). The Court held that the plaintiffs had received meaningful production by December 2007 and rejected the plaintiffs’ sanction request.

The Court stressed the high standard for the requested order - framed as a contempt order and striking a defence which the court said had merit. While it held that the defendants were not diligent in preventing electronic information from being downgraded (i.e. altered to be stored in a less accessible form) and even stated that it wondered whether this downgrading was purposeful, it held that this conduct did not merit a contempt order. It also did not draw an inference of malfeasance from the defendant’s sluggishness, recognizing that the discovery task wasn’t easy:

However, as we know, the parties were dealing, amongst other things, with 498 bankers’ boxes of documents and 427 backup tapes that contained information from Spielo’s previous computer system. Certain discrepancies in disclosure, or the misplacement or inadvertent overlooking of a document, is understandable given the enormous volume of material involved in this matter. This is not necessarily indicative of any culpable conduct or malfeasance on the part of the defendants.

While dismissing the motion, the Court did note that cross-examination at trial may shed more light on the issue of deliberate non-disclosure.

Doucet v. Spielo Manufacturing Inc., [2008] N.B.J. No. 27 (QL) (N.B. Q.B.). [CanLII award not yet available.]

On January 31, the Alberta Court of Appeal quashed a procedural appeal brought by a non-party to a longstanding commercial litigation dispute and, in doing so, made some comments on the use of information gathered in the discovery process.

The non-party appealed from an order which granted the plaintiffs partial relief from the implied undertaking and a confidentiality order. The non-party claimed the order caused it prejudice in a second related action, presumably in which it was a defendant. The Court rejected the prejudice argument (emphasis in original):

Since counsel for the appellant argued that he would be prejudiced if his client could not appeal, we went beyond mere status and inquired into the nature of the prejudice or injustice suggested. He seemed to think that the order under appeal put into evidence in the second suit against him, information gathered largely without his participation, even his knowledge, in the first suit.

That suggestion of ex parte injustice is not correct. Both the implied undertaking restricting the use of information got through discovery, and confidentiality orders, merely add an extra impediment to attempts to use evidence for purposes outside the original lawsuit. If those impediments are removed, then the information in question simply has the same status as all other information lying about in the great wide world.

The first rule of the law of evidence is that courts will not receive all information as evidence. Much of it is inadmissible: most hearsay, for example, and all irrelevant information. Therefore, waiving the implied undertaking rule, or lifting a confidentiality order, has no effect on such inadmissibility. What is inadmissible as evidence for other reasons other than confidentiality or implied undertakings remains inadmissible. To lift a confidentiality order or the implied undertaking merely allows the parties to another action to tender the information as evidence. It has no influence whatever on the judge or master’s decision about whether to accept it as evidence. The usual common-law rules of evidence (as modified by statute or Rules of Court) still apply.

The Court also noted that the order appealed from gave the non-party an express right to raise the matter of fairness in the second action.

Dreco Energy Services v. Wenzel Downhole Tools, 2008 ABCA 36 (CanLII).

On December 5th, a 2-1 majority of the Supreme Court of Ireland held that it was not improper to order a defendant to create and produce a special report from a database. However, a separately constituted majority held that, in the circumstances, the costs of such an order would be disproportionate to its benefit until and unless the plaintiff proved the defendant was liable.

The impugned order was made in the context of a competition law dispute. The plaintiff was a domestic seller of calling cards who claimed that the defendant network owner engaged in a discriminatory pricing practice that favoured foreign providers. It requested production of records of specific calls from one or more archived database files in order to prove liability and damages.

The parties argued the merits of the production request in light of another set of records that was also ordered to be produced. When it became apparent that the disclosure of the other set of records would not provide evidence the plaintiff felt it needed to meet its burden of proof, it pressed for production of the call records. The defendant only then strongly raised its proportionality concerns and made a factual admission which it claimed would render production unnecessary. It also claimed that the impugned order would require it to compile, analyze and present information in a form in which it never existed.

The defendant ultimately prevailed at the Supreme Court based on its proportionality argument. Fennelly J. and Kearns J.’s reasoning arguably turned on the plaintiff’s factual admission, which they held made production unnecessary to proof of liability and disproportionate in light of the cost of production (claimed to require the purchase of hardware costing approximately of €150,000 and significant other cost outlays to be made over a six month period). Both recognized the potential necessity of production to proof of damages, and held that the plaintiff may file a fresh application for discovery should it first prove liability. In reaching his finding Fennelly J. said:

I have come to the conclusion that the very unusual burden and heavy cost of the discovery in this case requires the Court to have a clear view of the litigious benefit to the plaintiff from obtaining the extremely detailed breakdown of information which is the only remaining issue.

Geoghegan J., dissenting on the proportionality issue, took the opposite view on the burden of proof, making comments that favoured a strict burden of proving disproportionate costs once evidence is shown to be relevant and necessary. He noted that the defendant had raised cost as a barrier to production well into the dispute and then had argued cost in its submissions without adducing supportive evidence. He said:

My overall impression is that essentially, the appellant was trying unsuccessfully to frighten the court by the mention of what superficially at least would be large figures but figures unsupported by solid evidence.

While the bifurcation of production in response to cost is novel and the dispute on burden of proof significant, the Court’s treatment of the “creating records” issue was dealt with on a more broadly-reasoned basis. Fennelly J. endorsed Geoghegan J.’s reasoning, and Kearns J. did not make comment. Geoghegan J. reasoned that the form in which data is stored is not relevant to the form in which its produced. He said:

It is common knowledge that a vast amount of stored information in the business world which formerly would have been in a documentary form in the traditional sense is now computerised. As a matter of fairness and common sense the courts must adapt themselves to this situation and fashion appropriate analogous orders of discovery. In order to achieve a reasonable parity with traditional documentary discovery it may well be necessary to direct a party “to create documents” within the meaning of the notice of appeal. It may indeed also be necessary to direct a party “to create documents” within the meaning of the notice of appeal even if such “documents” “do not exist at the time the order is made”. I am deliberately using quotation marks because I do not intend to adjudicate on the quasi-metaphysical argument of Mr. Paul Anthony McDermott, counsel for the respondent, that the “documents” do in fact “exist”. At any rate that matter can probably be argued both ways but I would be firmly of opinion that an order of discovery can be made which involves the creation of documents which do not exist, made in the kind of context in which it is sought in this case. Otherwise, potential litigants could operate their business computers in such a way that they would be able to evade any worthwhile discovery. In expressing the above views, I accept that superficially I am perhaps going a step further than the English authorities have done in so far as their rule of court can apparently be interpreted to cover computer discovery. I have no hesitation, however, in making that extension.

Dome Telecom v. Eircom, [2007] IESC 59.