In re Seroquel Products Liability Litigation
2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 61287, 244 F.R.D. 650, 2007 WL 2412946 (2007)
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Rule of Law:
A party's failure to produce electronic discovery in a usable, searchable format and its failure to cooperate in resolving technical production issues constitutes sanctionable conduct under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37. Such conduct, characterized as "purposeful sluggishness," warrants sanctions even if a prior motion to compel was not formally granted, especially where the offending party made commitments to cure deficiencies to avoid a court ruling.
Facts:
- Numerous plaintiffs sued AstraZeneca (AZ), an international pharmaceutical corporation, for alleged injuries, including diabetes, caused by ingesting its drug, Seroquel.
- The development of Seroquel, which spanned many years, generated a massive volume of electronically stored information.
- AstraZeneca maintained numerous relevant databases concerning Seroquel, including those for adverse events, sales calls, clinical trials, and regulatory matters.
- AstraZeneca designated certain employees as "custodians," identified as those most knowledgeable about Seroquel, from whom electronic discovery was to be collected and produced.
- The electronic files to be produced contained essential 'metadata' (e.g., creation dates, authors), which provided context for the documents.
- AZ utilized an outside vendor to assist with the collection and production of its electronic data.
- A key part of AZ's regulatory filings, the CANDA, contained Item 12 (Case Report Forms) which was stored on now-obsolete DLT tapes.
Procedural Posture:
- Numerous lawsuits against AstraZeneca were consolidated into a multidistrict litigation (MDL) and transferred to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida.
- The court entered a Case Management Order (CMO 2) that established a schedule and protocols for discovery, including the production of electronic data.
- Plaintiffs filed a Motion to Compel, alleging that AstraZeneca had failed to produce complete and usable discovery as required by CMO 2.
- The court denied the motion without prejudice, ordering the parties to confer in good faith and warning that sanctions could be imposed for unreasonable conduct.
- Based on AstraZeneca's representations that it would correct the technical deficiencies, the parties filed a joint notice that the scheduled evidentiary hearing was no longer needed.
- Less than a month later, Plaintiffs filed the instant Motion for Discovery Sanctions, arguing that AstraZeneca had failed to fulfill its promises to cure the production issues.
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Issue:
Does a party's failure to timely produce electronic discovery in a usable, searchable format and its uncooperative efforts to resolve technical issues constitute sanctionable conduct under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37, even where a prior motion to compel was denied without prejudice after the party agreed to cure the deficiencies?
Opinions:
Majority - Baker, United States Magistrate Judge
Yes, a party's failure to produce electronic discovery in a usable format and its uncooperative behavior constitutes sanctionable conduct. The court found that some of AstraZeneca's (AZ) conduct, such as its delayed production of certain organizational charts and a specific regulatory filing (Item 12), amounted to excusable neglect and was not sanctionable. However, AZ’s failures regarding its databases and its main 'custodial production' were sanctionable violations of e-discovery rules and principles. The court rejected AZ’s procedural argument that sanctions were improper because a motion to compel had not been granted; AZ had sufficient notice of its deficiencies and avoided a ruling by promising to fix the very issues that persisted. The court found AZ engaged in 'purposeful sluggishness,' particularly in its custodial production, by delivering millions of pages in a non-searchable, unusable format with significant technical flaws (e.g., no page breaks, inconsistent metadata, missing attachments). Furthermore, AZ's unilateral and 'plainly inadequate' use of secret keyword searches, and its refusal to allow its technical personnel to confer with Plaintiffs' experts, was 'antithetical to the Sedona Principles' and demonstrated a failure to cooperate in good faith as required in complex litigation. This conduct hindered discovery and prejudiced the Plaintiffs, thus warranting sanctions under Rule 37.
Analysis:
This case is a foundational opinion in the law of electronic discovery, emphasizing that mere production of data is insufficient; the data must be produced in a 'reasonably usable' form. The decision highlights the duty of cooperation between parties, particularly in defining search methodology like keyword terms, as a central tenet of the discovery process. It establishes that a party cannot hide behind the complexity of its own data or the mistakes of its third-party vendors to excuse non-compliance. The court's adoption of the phrase 'purposeful sluggishness' provides a framework for sanctioning parties who use delay and obstruction as a litigation tactic, even without evidence of willful spoliation, thereby setting a higher standard for accountability in managing e-discovery.
