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In this case, the defendant sought to compel the production of additional information and sanctions for plaintiff’s destruction of her computer. Following its analysis of the facts, including plaintiff’s admission that the computer used during the time of her alleged harassment had been burned and replaced, the court granted defendant’s motions and compelled production of additional ESI as well as plaintiff’s new computer and imposed sanctions, including an adverse inference instruction.
Plaintiff sued the Mobile County Health Department alleging reverse discrimination. In the course of discovery, the defendant requested production of all documents, including ESI, related to the allegations contained in the complaint. Thereafter, the court entered a scheduling order which included specific instruction for plaintiff to preserve relevant information. Initially, plaintiff made no production, but eventually produced a small number of documents at her deposition and admitted to the existence of others, including emails. Despite the fact that plaintiff would ultimately claim that her computer had been destroyed, she did not reveal the destruction at her deposition.
Following plaintiff’s deposition, defendant revived its request that plaintiff produce ESI in her possession, including information she described at deposition, and requested that plaintiff allow defendant to inspect her personal computer. When repeated requests produced unsatisfactory results, defendant filed a motion to compel. Several days later, plaintiff’s counsel revealed the destruction of plaintiff’s computer for the first time. Subsequently, plaintiff revealed that that her 13-year-old computer had crashed sometime in June or July 2011, approximately eight months after her complaint was filed. She further alleged that after taking the computer to Best Buy’s “Geek Squad” she was advised to “just buy another computer” and thus burned her computer because of the personal information it contained and the “threat of identity theft.” She also purchased a new computer. Accordingly, defendant filed a motion for sanctions and requested dismissal of plaintiff’s case.
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