You need to read this article if you think the best way to preserve the evidence you see on screen is to whip out your 1.3 megapixel digital camera and snap a picture of your computer monitor. But what do you do if you want to save an entire Web page or perhaps a video from a Web site? How do you save that smoking-gun evidence that is visible on your computer screen today that might quickly disappear or get torn down once defense counsel warns his or her client that you are sniffing around the Net for incriminating evidence?
Turning over the Net captures to the defendant in a supplemental federal Rule 26 exchange resulted in a case resolution.Įveryone knows how to “right click” the mouse and press “save picture as” to download and save a picture or image file. With our capture software we were able to preserve the evidence for use at trial. The presentation discussed defendant’s business expansion plans and clearly contradicted the VP’s deposition testimony that defendant was winding down the business. On the Web site was a presentation that a defendant vice president had presented to conference attendees. If the jury believed the defendant’s claim that during that one year in question, the defendant was winding down its operations instead of expanding its business, our client would not have had a case.Īn Internet search took us to a Web site that discussed an industry conference that senior officers of the defendant corporation attended. If true, this would have dramatically decreased the plaintiff’s damages. One time we had a trial where the defendant alleged that during the time period in question, it was getting out of a business. (For $20 you can get smoking-gun evidence and feed your Perry Mason fantasies. Later at trial you can beat the Defendant CEO on the side of the head with your digital printouts, to where he leaps out of the witness chair, confesses and begs you to settle the case for $20 million. I don’t know about you, but I can’t think of a better return on a $20 investment.įor what an appetizer at a restaurant costs in my town, you can gather and preserve evidence. This article will discuss how for just $20 (that’s right, a measly $20 bill!) you can obtain smoking-gun evidence from the Net and use it to win that multi-million dollar case. In the legal world, the Net is more and more becoming a source of data and information that properly preserved can later become evidence in a case. Almost every night on the news you see the anchors posting images of Web pages, video clips and other information that are either the subject of the story or that provide background information.
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