Murphy v. Piper - test your search terms

Two days ago, in Murphy v. Piper, No. 16-2623, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 205750 (D. Minn.), the United States District Court for the District of Minnesota, reviewed a decision by Magistrate Judge Becky R. Thorson on search terms to be used for discovery, and the temporal scope of the search. The court concluded that the information was relevant and that responding to discovery in the date range would not be undue burden. Judge Donovan W. Frank noted that, "the demonstrated relevance of each of Plaintiffs' proposed search terms and Defendant's failure to adequately support her claimed burden in utilizing those search terms."

The court also upheld the Magistrate Judge's decision to refuse to approve a motion to premptively preclude the discovery of privileged documents. The opinion states that, "the Court agrees with the Magistrate Judge's conclusion that any claimed privilege with respect to particular discovery requests can be addressed through the parties' privilege logs and, if necessary, motion practice to resolve a dispute."