Leonard Deutchman

January 15, 2013 | The Legal Intelligencer

In Commonwealth v. Cruttenden, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court held that a law enforcement officer, in possession of a suspect's cellphone, did not perform an "interception" under Pennsylvania's Wiretap Act when the officer, pretending to be the suspect, exchanged text messages with a co-defendant.

By Leonard Deutchman

12 minute read

April 10, 2006 | The Legal Intelligencer

When parties in a civil matter want to obtain evidence from their opponents, they must demand discovery and trust that all relevant information will be produced in pristine form. The proliferation of computers in every aspect of business and personal affa

By Leonard Deutchman

7 minute read

August 09, 2011 | The Legal Intelligencer

In my November 2010 column, "Is E-Discovery Practice the New Fourth Amendment?" I posed the question of whether Victor Stanley Inc. v. Creative Pipe Inc. in the U.S. District Court for Maryland and Rockwood v. SKF USA in the U.S. District Court for New Hampshire signaled a trend toward courts using sanctions for e-discovery violations as they do the exclusionary rule for Fourth Amendment violations, i.e. — to "police" the practice of e-discovery generally by imposing sanctions not simply to punish the litigant, but to deter the future misconduct of others.

By Leonard Deutchman

14 minute read

April 10, 2012 | The Legal Intelligencer

Section 1920(4) of Title 28, U.S. Code, makes fees for "the costs of making copies of any materials where the copies are necessarily obtained for use in the case" "taxable" against the losing party in a civil matter. In Race Tires America v. Hoosier Racing Tire, No. 11-2316 (3d Cir. March 16, 2012), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, reversing the district court, held that such costs were not taxable, employing reasoning that is understandable but, in my opinion, wrong. Background

By Leonard Deutchman

11 minute read

July 21, 2008 | The Legal Intelligencer

It is an understatement to observe that the focus, if not the obsession, of e-discovery production today is the production of e-mail.

By Leonard Deutchman

10 minute read

October 09, 2006 | The Legal Intelligencer

Rule 37(f), one of the key changes in the upcoming e-discovery (EDD) amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, helps define what steps a party must take to preserve potentially discoverable electronically-stored information (ESI) within an elect

By Leonard Deutchman

6 minute read

October 21, 2011 | Legaltech News

Attorney Leonard Deutchman looks at how the Pennsylvania Superior Court addressed the technical differences between text messages and emails in Commonwealth v. Koch.

By Leonard Deutchman

11 minute read

January 15, 2007 | The Legal Intelligencer

In previous articles we have discussed how case law and the recent changes to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure require parties to preserve potentially discoverable electronically stored information ("ESI"), meet and confer early in the litigation to a

By Leonard Deutchman

13 minute read

May 11, 2010 | The Legal Intelligencer

The "plain view" doctrine of the Fourth Amendment holds that law enforcement properly authorized to be in a certain area can lawfully search and seize evidence seen in plain view from that vantage point.

By Leonard Deutchman

14 minute read

September 11, 2006 | The Legal Intelligencer

Everyone has heard of computer searches, and we've all seen some version of them in films or on television, usually when criminal investigations are depicted. Civil litigators, however, may have a hard time seeing how computer searches fit into their case

By Leonard Deutchman

6 minute read