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In The Country Vintner of North Carolina v. E. & J. Gallo Winery Inc., the prevailing party, Gallo, submitted a bill to the court under Title 28 of the U.S. Code Section 1920(4), seeking to recover its e-discovery costs. Gallo attempted to recoup $111,047.75, but the 4th Circuit only allowed it to recover $218.59, because many of the costs it asserted were not taxable under the statute. Below is a breakdown of the specific costs Gallo asserted, according to the 4th Circuit’s decision and whether they were or were not taxable:

  • $71,910: “Flattening” and “indexing” electronically stored information—initial processing that included making the data searchable and removing duplicate files. Not taxable.
  • $15,660: “Searching/Review Set/Data Extraction,” a process that included removing metadata and loading relevant documents onto a “review/production” platform. Not taxable.
  • $178.59: Converting native documents to TIFF or PDF format. Taxable.
  • $74.16: “Bates numbering,” or stamping documents with a number that allowed them to be found later. Not taxable.
  • $40: Moving images to CDs. Taxable.
  • $23,185: Processing, analyzing and preparing data for production. Not taxable.