California E-Discovery Act Signed into Law

This post was written by Meghan Landrum and Renee Feldman.

California’s tireless Civil Justice Association of California sponsored an electronic discovery bill that was signed into law on June 29, 2009 by Governor Schwarzenegger. The Electronic Discovery Act (“the Act”) establishes procedures for litigants when obtaining discovery of electronically stored information in California. The Act amends the California Code of Civil Procedure, effective immediately, by adding provisions specifically related to electronic discovery.

Modeled after similar electronic discovery rules in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the Act strives to strike a balance between making ESI available to a requesting party without over-burdening a responding party who utilizes mass quantities of ESI in its normal course of business. For more information, please read Reed Smith’s full alert.