A colleague and I recently published an article in BNA’s Digital Discovery & e-Evidence® discussing the recent sanctions against Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP, in Apple, Inc. v. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd, et. al., 5:11-cv-01846 (N.D. Cal. Jan. 29, 2014). Our article, “Protecting Confidential Information: Lessons from the Apple v. Samsung Firestorm,” tells a cautionary tale, in which a court found that one law firm’s failure to implement certain quality control measures transformed a single associate’s omitted redaction into grounds for costly motion practice and sanctions against both the law firm and its client.
As Quinn Emanuel and Samsung learned the hard way, serious consequences await those who are found to have mishandled confidential information received from other parties in the course of litigation. Avoiding these consequences begins with implementing appropriate quality control measures, including multi-tiered reviews of highly sensitive documents. But it also requires vigilance by in-house counsel, who circulate potentially confidential information internally at their own peril. Continue reading here.