| Victor Stanley Update: Court Approves Sanction Of More Than $1,000,000 |
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As you may remember, Judge Paul Grimm recently sanctioned a Defendant in Victor Stanley, Inc. v. Creative Pipe, Inc. in the form of attorneys' fees and costs associated with spoliation, default judgment on the primary count alleged by the spoliator and two years of imprisonment for civil contempt, although the imprisonment sanction was later vacated. Recently, the Plaintiff submitted a Bill of Costs seeking a total of $936,503.75 in attorneys' fees and $148,297.04 in costs related to the Defendants' spoliation. Using the lodestar method, the Court calculated the reasonable amount of attorneys' fees as $901,553.00, generally denying the Defendants' argument that the Plaintiff was seeking reimbursement for fees unrelated to spoliation. The Court noted that the Defendants' began destroying evidence when litigation began. Likewise, the Court ordered the full amount of costs requested as part of the sanction, including $95,969.04 for retaining a third-party software company to assist with the recovery of deleted files. The total amount of the discovery sanction ordered by Judge Grimm was $1,049,850.04 For a copy of the opinion, click here. |