March 20, 2011

Facebook and divorce litigation

The following is an interesting article on the use of social media in litgation.  http://www.law.com/jsp/cc/PubArticleCC.jsp?id=1202484355664&Eureka_Discovering_and_Using_Social_Media_in_Litigation

Social media most often comes up during the discovery phase of custody disputes.  It is amazing what people will post on their wall.  Social media, however, can be very difficult to preserve and to obtain.

Based upon the stored communications act, courts have granted motions to quash seeking to block subpoenas issued direclty to Facebook and MySpace.  The best way to obtain the data is directly from the user via the discovery process. 

The lawyers at Stephens & Margolin LLP are both knowledgeable about social media and the discovery issues that it raises.