Preserving Evidence When Litigation Is Reasonably Anticipated
The Legal Intelligencer
February 6, 2013
The recent trial between technology leaders Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co. was closely followed by electronics consumers worldwide. The technology at issue was cutting-edge. However, the case, Apple v. Samsung Electronics, Civil Action 11-1846 (N.D. Cal 2012) (referenced opinions at Docket Nos. 1321 and 1894), also produced an e-discovery opinion that brings us back to the core of a party's duty to preserve evidence in anticipation of litigation. Full Text
Discovery Collection Strategy: A Hybrid Approach
The Legal Intelligencer
January 30, 2013
As in-house counsel at a large company, you just received discovery requests from opposing counsel in one of your active matters. You speak with outside counsel and decide it is time to search and collect email and documents from 20 employees and executives who are likely to have relevant information. After talking with your CIO, you have a basic understanding of the company's IT landscape and know that each of the 20 "custodians" is likely to have data on his or her hard drive and in his or her mailbox, and possibly on network share drives and applications. Full Text
Best Practices for Corporate Internal Investigations
The Legal Intelligencer
January 23, 2013
By now, the concept of Upjohn warnings should be familiar to any counsel, whether in-house or external, who represents a corporation's interests in an internal investigation. In a nutshell, an Upjohn warning is derived from the Supreme Court decision in Upjohn v. United States, 449 U.S. 383 (1981), and is a mechanism for establishing corporate privilege by which corporate counsel explains to the corporation's officers and employees that when the individual officer or employee provides a statement to corporate counsel in the course of an internal corporate investigation, it is the corporation — and not the individual — that holds the attorney-client privilege for that statement. Full Text
Picking Up the Pieces of a Corporate Reputation
The Legal Intelligencer
January 16, 2013
In a compliance meltdown, failure is on such a massive scale that it can put the company in peril of dissolution. Reputation is lost, customers and suppliers avoid the organization, talent leaks away and the business is starved of the fuel it needs. In the most severe cases, the entity ceases to function, as happened at Arthur Andersen & Co. Full Text
Do Companies Sue Competitors to Learn Trade Secrets?
The Legal Intelligencer
January 9, 2013
In the new millennium, employee mobility is the norm. Gone are the halcyon days when employees worked for one company for their entire career. One consequence of greater employee mobility is the proliferation of trade secret claims. When an employee leaves one company to work for a competitor, it is not unusual for the former employer to sue the new employer for misappropriation of trade secrets. Full Text
Top Six Tech Issues of 2012 for In-House Counsel
The Legal Intelligencer
January 2, 2013
Made your list and checked it twice? Don't forget about the most important law and technology developments in 2012 — which can also help guide in-house counsel in the new year. Here, Foley & Lardner attorney Adam Losey, who also edits the online nonprofit IT-Lex and is a member of the editorial advisory board for Law Technology News (a sibling publication of The Legal), walks us through his top six tech issues of the year: Full Text
Deciding When Termination Is the Right Step to Take
The Legal Intelligencer
December 26, 2012
The toughest decision that lawyers, in-house or otherwise, help clients make is whether to impose the employment-law equivalent of capital punishment: termination of an employee. While clients look to attorneys for counsel, sometimes they really want us to make the decision — for that cup to pass from them. Here are five questions to ask to ensure the decision is the right one at the right time: Full Text
How Much Evidence Is Needed to Overcome Attorney-Client Privilege?
The Legal Intelligencer
December 19, 2012
How much evidence is enough to establish the crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege? With its recent opinion in In re Grand Jury, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit addressed the issue in the context of subpoenas issued to the former in-house counsel of a company subject to a grand jury investigation. Full Text
Today's General Counsel Must Be a Jack of All Trades
The Legal Intelligencer
December 12, 2012
When the insider trading and backdating scandals occurred in the last decade, many asked, "Where were the lawyers?" Full Text
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