Siani v. State Univ. of New York at Farmingdale, 2010 WL 3170664 (E.D.N.Y. Aug. 10, 2010)

In this employment discrimination case, the court denied the pro se plaintiff’s motion for spoliation sanctions, despite finding defendants were at least negligent in their preservation efforts, where plaintiff failed to present extrinsic evidence “tending to show that the destroyed emails would have been favorable to his case.”

Plaintiff alleged that defendants failed to preserve electronic evidence and requested an adverse inference.  Specifically, plaintiff alleged that emails were deleted by both named defendants and non-party employees of the university in violation of their duty to preserve.

Defendants presented evidence that following receipt of notice of plaintiff’s claim, multiple litigation hold notices were disseminated and individuals subject to the hold were repeatedly reminded of their preservation obligations.  The employee in charge of the university’s IT department also backed up the email accounts of the named defendants (employees of the university), but admitted he did not back up his own email account or accounts belonging to any relevant non-parties.  Nor did he suspend the automatic deletion cycle.  Despite the hold, certain named defendants and non-parties admitted that emails were deleted either unintentionally or in the course of routine cleaning.  Still, some of the deleted emails were available from alternative sources.

via Despite Negligent Preservation, Failure to Establish Relevance of Lost Emails Results in Denial of Motion for Sanctions : Electronic Discovery Law.