RELEVANT CASE STUDIES
QZO, Inc. v. Moyer
Default Judgment Issued Against Party For Destroying Computer Evidence
594 S.E. 2d 541 (S.C. App. 2004)
The plaintiff suspected the defendant, former officer at plaintiff's
corporation, had plans to compete. The plaintiff was granted a temporary
restraining order (TRO), which required the defendant to turn over his
work laptop computer to the plaintiff. The defendant took seven days to
turn over his computer, and when he did so, a computer forensic expert
determined that the hard drive had been reformatted the day before. The
reformatting destroyed any possible evidence that would have shown the
defendant's plan to compete. The court held that the defendant had
willfully destroyed evidence related to the case and violated the TRO,
and based on this, the court assigned liability to the defendant. The
appellate court affirmed the judgment denying the defendant's argument
that there was insufficient evidence to support the sanctions the
plaintiff was seeking.
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