In litigation, the duty to preserve and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure go hand in hand, as Cimplifi discusses in this post.

In their post titled (wait for it!) Know When to Hold Em: Duty to Preserve and the Federal Rules (available here), Cimplifi discusses how preserving evidence has always been a cornerstone of fairness in litigation, but the explosion of electronically stored information (ESI) over the past two decades has made it one of the most complex and contentious aspects of discovery. The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP) set the standards for when and how parties must preserve ESI, as well as the potential consequences when they fail to do so.

But it’s not enough to just understand the current rules. It’s important to understand the relevant history. Prior to the landmark 2015 amendments to the FRCP, courts across the country applied inconsistent standards for sanctions, creating uncertainty and the potential for over-preservation. The 2015 revisions – particularly to Rules 26, 34, and 37 – brought long-awaited uniformity and proportionality to preservation obligations, helping parties strike a better balance between defensibility and practicality.

So, what were the preservation requirements pre-2015? And what three rules were central to the transformation aimed to promote cooperation, proportionality, and uniformity in 2015? Find out here, it’s only one click! The rules for clicking never change! 😉

So, what do you think? How is your organization managing legal holds? Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Image created using Microsoft Designer, using the term “professionally dressed robots at a poker table playing poker with some holding cards”.

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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.