Jensen v. eClinical Works, LLC

29 Mass. L. Rptr. 380
CourtMassachusetts Superior Court
DecidedFebruary 3, 2012
DocketNo. WOCV201000328D
StatusPublished

This text of 29 Mass. L. Rptr. 380 (Jensen v. eClinical Works, LLC) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts Superior Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Jensen v. eClinical Works, LLC, 29 Mass. L. Rptr. 380 (Mass. Ct. App. 2012).

Opinion

Wilkins, Douglas H., J.

In this contract and c. 93A action, the plaintiffs seek discovery of certain electronic records not previously produced in response to their requests for production of documents, served in September 2010, and this Court’s orders of May 16, 2011 and November 2, 2011. Despite the Court’s [381]*381efforts to encourage a cooperative approach, the parties have not agreed upon a method for accomplishing this electronic discovery. The Court therefore sets specific parameters for electronic discovery of the records in question and imposes the costs of this task upon the defendant, which has blocked this discovery long enough. It orders entry of a proposed amended confidentiality order, substantially in the form proposed by the plaintiffs, with an additional provision to protect privileged documents against inadvertent production. The Court also awards the plaintiffs their attorneys fees for their efforts commencing with their Motion for Order of Civil Contempt Pursuant to M.R.C.P. 37(b)(2) and for Appropriate Sanctions (“Motion”) and continuing through the present.

BACKGROUND

The plaintiffs, Jonathan E. Jensen, M.D., Front Range Gastroenterology, P.C. and Colorado Endoscopy Centers, L.L.C. (collectively, “Jensen”), brought this case on February 11, 2010, for alleged breach of the eClinical Works Software License and Support Up Front Agreement dated September 22, 2006 (“Agreement”) between Jensen and the defendant eClinical Works, LLC (“eCW’). Before bringing suit, Jensen sent a demand letter on February 11, 2009, setting forth their claims and estimating damages in the amount of $150,244.00. Among Jensen’s claims is the assertion that eCW fraudulently induced Jensen to purchase the software by knowingly making false representations about the Software’s capabilities. Because the complaint includes a c. 93A count, potential treble damages exceed $420,000.

Jensen served the contested request for production of documents on September 22, 2010. After receiving objections to seven requests, Jensen moved to compel production. The parties did not agree to a confidentiality order, forcing the Court to issue its own confidentiality order effective May 31, 2011. The Court also ordered production of additional documents. On June 13, 2011, eCW produced more than 6,000 previously-withheld documents.

On October 13, 2011, the plaintiffs filed the Motion, citing a number of publicly available sources of information showing complaints about the performance of eCWs software. The Court inferred from this information that there must have been additional documents associated with those complaints and declined to credit eCWs affidavit attesting to full production. The Court held a hearing on the Motion on October 27, 2011. On October 31, 2011, the Court entered the following order, docketed on November 2, 2011:

Motion (P#21) After hearing and review of the papers, the motion for a Rule 37 order is ALLOWED. Defendant shall forthwith allow plaintiff access to its servers to search for documents responsive to plaintiffs’ request. I do not credit the defendant’s affidavit in light of the arguments and exhibits presented by the plaintiffs showing that at least some of the matters not produced do fall within the time frame and parameters of the request. Any further relief shall await the results of the server search.

On November 23, 2011, the plaintiffs filed a motion to compel the defendant to comply with the October 31 Order. The Court held a hearing on November 29, 2011. On December 5, 2011, it further ordered that Jensen have access to eCWs servers to search for responsive electronically stored information, provided that “(d)ocuments dated or received after September 22, 2006 may be searched only if the documents reflect knowledge or statements before that date or are reasonably calculated to do so. There shall be no limitation as to customers.” The Court allowed the parties until December 9, 2011, to agree upon an independent vendor to perform the necessaiy technical consulting services. The Court deferred action on the plaintiffs’ request for a budget of $10,000 for the consultant, payable by the defendants. On December 19, the Court denied the defendant’s motion for reconsideration, filed December 15, 2011.

Jensen engaged Stroz Friedberg, LLC (“Stroz Friedberg”) as its forensic consultant and executed an agreement. Pursuant to the Court’s order, the parties met on December 16,2011 to “discuss how the Analyst can best determine what records and documents can be searched and how they can be searched.” Also pursuant to the order, the parties filed the consultant’s written summary of the scope and manner of the search on December 23,2011 and filed their proposals on December 26, 2011.

Before the December 16, 2011 site visit, Stroz Friedberg sent a list of questions to eCW. While the parties did discuss matters at that meeting, eCW has failed to provide basic information in response to such questions as:

What electronic locations have already been accessed, secured or searched in order to produce the documents that have previously been provided in discovery?
How are emails stored by eCWs offsite “Rackspace” vendor archived, where else might relevant emails be found; and how can they be searched?
What “fields” are included in the data bases to be searched?

These are basic questions, seeking information that is essential to conduct an effective and efficient search for documents. The enumeration of these questions is not intended to limit the information that eCW should reasonably provide to facilitate the court-ordered search of electronic data, including the information sought by Mr. Titus in his emails of December 22 and 23.

eCW does not contend that it answered these questions, choosing instead to attack Stroz Friedberg’s timing in posing the questions. The questions are, [382]*382however, an obvious and natural outgrowth of the preliminary questions that were relayed to the defendant by email dated as early as December 13, 2011. In any event, nothing about the timing changes the inherent reasonableness of the questions or the fact that any reasonable defendant, committed to a good faith resolution of this discovery issue, would have provided the information. Even now, more than a month after the December 16 meeting, eCW chooses to litigate rather than cooperate. eCWs choice not to answer these questions makes it more than equitable for eCW to bear the full cost of obtaining this information. eCW has no cause for complaint that Stroz Friedberg may end up duplicating some of eCWs efforts, where it will not even disclose what efforts, if any, it has already' made. Indeed, refusal to provide such basic information gives rise to the inference that eCW believes that the answers could put it in a bad light.

The site visit revealed that relevant data may be found on certain company servers. There is no need to access “tape backup” servers. The emails stored by “Rackspace” are fair game, where eCWhas failed to provide information to assess the cost or usefulness of accessing those emails. In addition, it appears that some employees’ computer hard drives may contain the requested information. While these may not be “servers” within the meaning of the Court’s December 5, 2011 order, they are certainly sources of accessible and potentially responsive information. eCW should have searched them as part of its prior responses to this Court’s May 16, 2011 order.

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Bluebook (online)
29 Mass. L. Rptr. 380, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/jensen-v-eclinical-works-llc-masssuperct-2012.