Zubulake v. UBS Warburg LLC

In Zubulake v. UBS Warburg LLC, 220 FRD 212 (SD NY 2003), in addressing spoliation sanctions for the destruction of electronic evidence, the court held that the party seeking sanctions must establish that: "(1) the party having control over the evidence had an obligation to preserve it at the time it was destroyed, (2) that the records were destroyed with a 'culpable state of mind' and (3) that the destroyed evidence was 'relevant' to the parties claim or defense." A "culpable state of mind," as described in the second part of the test includes ordinary negligence. Id. With regard to the third part of the test, the courts have found that relevance of the destroyed evidence can be inferred when it is shown that such evidence was destroyed in bad faith or as the result of a party's grossly negligent conduct. Id. In Zubulake v. UBS Warburg LLC, the court also addressed the obligations of counsel and litigants to preserve electronic data. It wrote that "once a party reasonably anticipates litigation it must suspend its routine document retention/destruction policy and put in place a 'litigation hold' to ensure the preservation of relevant documents." Id. at 218. In a subsequent motion in the same case, the court wrote that: A party's discovery obligations do not end with the implementation of a 'litigation hold'-to the contrary, that's only the beginning. Counsel must oversee compliance with the litigation hold, monitoring the party's efforts to retain and produce relevant documents. Proper communication between a party and her lawyer will ensure (1) that all relevant information (or at least sources of relevant information) is discovered, (2) that relevant information is retained on a continuing basis; and (3) that relevant non-privileged material is produced to the opposing party. (Zubulake v. UBS Warburg LLC, 229 FRD at 432.)