Date: 2006-01-06 Docket: M022824. H.A. Slade J. | Link

Defendant applied for an order that the plaintiff provide to the solicitors for the defendants her PowerBook computer, including but not limited to the computer's hard drive and any removable floppy CD or other DVD disks containing data originating on her PowerBook computer, twenty days before the scheduled start of the trial in an action that had commenced in 2004. Examinations for discovery had already been completed and expert reports exchanged. Defendant was willing to pay for the imaging of the hard disk. The court rejected the idea advanced by the defendant that the hard disk is a document that should have been produced, stating: "As it is the information and not the medium for its storage that may be relevant, I see no basis for the delivery of the hard drive as a document and no basis from departure from the general rule that plaintiff's counsel have the first opportunity to vet any information derived from it for relevance." (para 27) "In the circumstances, taking account of the marginal value for trial purposes and the onerous burden it would put on the plaintiff late in the day, I conclude that I should exercise my discretion in this matter in favour of the plaintiff." (para 32)