In 2011, The Sedona Conference® (TSC) made the first version of the Cooperation Proclamation: Resources for the Judiciary (Judicial Resources) available on the Sedona Conference website.  They then updated it in 2014, just over three years later.  I covered them both.  🙂  Took a while (about 5 1/2 years), but they just updated it again.

As TSC notes in their announcement email, this Third Edition and first revision of the Judicial Resources since 2014 reflects amendments to state and federal eDiscovery rules, developments in case law, and advances in technology. This edition appears at a particularly important time, as almost all day-to-day business and personal activities are taking place online, generating an unprecedented volume and variety of electronically stored information (ESI) that may be subject to discovery in later litigation.

This edition, available FREE for individual download here, provides state and federal trial judges with a comprehensive but easy-to-follow guide to eDiscovery case management, based on the precepts of The Sedona Conference Cooperation Proclamation.

The Judicial Resources is structured around 20 stages of civil litigation when judicial management is most appropriate or desirable, ranging from Preservation through Form or Forms of Production through Presentation of electronic evidence at trials (still not done!) to Post-judgment costs.  Very comprehensive!  For each stage, the Judicial Resources:

• Identifies key issues that a judge is likely to face at each stage of litigation;
• Suggests strategies for case management or dispute resolution that encourage the parties, when possible, to reach a cooperative resolution at each stage;
• Provides exemplar court decisions or orders; and
• Recommends further readings on the issues presented at each stage that have been published by The Sedona Conference or are peer-reviewed.

The Judicial Resources is the product of a two-year effort to assemble case law and materials that bear on case management and incorporates the advice and significant contributions of TSC’s Judicial Review Panel:

• Hon. Helen C. Adams (S.D. Iowa),
• Hon. J. Michelle Childs (D.S.C.),
• Hon. Timothy S. Driscoll (N.Y. Sup. Ct.),
• Hon. Xavier Rodriguez (W.D. Tex.), and
• Hon. Elizabeth M. Schwabedissen (Fla. 11th Jud. Cir.).

The Third Edition is contained within a 60-page PDF guide that splits the difference in size between the first edition (40 pages) and the second edition (91 pages!).  Needless to say, the latest edition is very timely as it has been 5 1/2 years since the last edition and a lot has happened during that time (especially in the last 1/2 year).

Also, just a reminder that on Wednesday, July 15, ACEDS will conduct the webinar Seeing 20/20: Reasonable and Proportional Discovery in 2020 at 1pm ET (noon CT, 10am PT).  Come join Mandi Ross of Prism Litigation Technology, Martin Tully of Actuate Law and me where we’ll discuss challenges with “right-sizing” discovery proportionally and defensibly, what can be leveraged from the rules and relevant case law regarding proportionality, and what best practices can be deployed for quick evaluation of potentially relevant custodians and data sources.  Don’t miss it!

So, what do you think?  Have you checked out the latest Judicial Resources guide yet?  If so, what did you think?   Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by my employer, my partners or my clients. eDiscovery Today is made available solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Today should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.