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Judge orders plaintiff to produce Facebook file

By June 13th, 2022No Comments
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Gavel to Gavel appears in The Journal Record. This column was originally published in The Journal Record on June 23, 2016.


Cody J. Cooper is an attorney whose practice is concentrated in commercial litigation, product liability, and intellectual property.

By Phillips Murrah Attorney Cody J. Cooper

The prevalence of social media continues to change litigation practices. As the availability of data about individuals related to social media continues to increase, so do the requests by opposing parties for this information. This necessarily requires analysis by the courts.

In an April order, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri wrestled with this very issue when it ordered a plaintiff to provide the defendant with her “Download Your Info” report from Facebook. See Rhone v. Schneider Nat’l Carriers, Inc., et al., No. 15-cv-01096 (E.D. Mo. 2015).

That lawsuit arose from a car accident and the plaintiff claimed severe, permanent and progressive physical and mental injuries that affected her lifestyle and ability to work.

During discovery, the defendant requested all of the plaintiff’s social media posts made since the date of the accident. The plaintiff simply responded “none.” The defendant then conducted an independent investigation and discovered substantial activity on the plaintiff’s Facebook profile, including posts about dancing and socializing. The defendant contended this was directly relevant to the plaintiff’s injuries.

The parties failed to reach an agreement on production of the information, so the defendant filed a motion to compel plaintiff to produce her Facebook data file. The court found that the plaintiff had failed to comply with her discovery obligations and ordered the plaintiff to download and produce to the defendant the Facebook data file, which includes all active posts, photos, videos and check-ins. The defendant claimed information had already been deleted and requested sanctions against the plaintiff, but the court decided to wait to determine whether the data file would show the alleged deleted information.

The case is still active, and it demonstrates the continued developing trend on treatment of social media. Particularly in case of personal injuries, but even in purely business disputes, postings by either party can become relevant and will likely be subject to discovery; efforts to delete or hide this information will typically result in severe penalties.

If you want to download your Facebook data file, go to settings, then the general tab, and click the link on the bottom – “Download a copy of your Facebook data” – and follow the instructions.

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