In Maquet Cardiovascular LLC v. Abiomed, Inc., 2026 WL 381370 (D. Mass. Feb. 11, 2026), the District of Massachusetts delivered a pointed reminder that litigation holds must be meaningful, and that preservation obligations can extend beyond a company’s formal employees. The dispute centered on alleged spoliation of emails and other ESI belonging to a consultant who was also the first-named inventor of the asserted patent. Although the company issued a litigation hold in January 2016 after being accused of infringement, it later decommissioned its on-premises Microsoft Exchange servers without ensuring that the consultant’s pre-2016 emails were preserved or migrated. Years later, significant portions of that ESI were missing, and conflicting representations emerged regarding whether the consultant had used company-issued or personal devices. The court concluded that relevant ESI was likely lost and characterized the company’s preservation efforts as, at best, “casual and haphazard,” but stopped short of finding intentional spoliation.
Applying Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37(e), the court held that spoliation had occurred because the company failed to take reasonable steps to preserve ESI it was obligated to maintain once litigation was anticipated. However, the court declined to impose an adverse inference instruction, finding insufficient evidence that the ESI was destroyed with the specific intent to deprive the opposing party of its use in litigation, as required under Rule 37(e)(2). The motion for an adverse inference was therefore denied without prejudice, leaving open the possibility that sanctions could be revisited if further factual development supported a finding of intent.
The order also addressed proportionality and control issues in connection with additional discovery requests. The plaintiff sought ESI from the consultant’s personal laptops, but the court declined to compel that discovery, noting that the consultant was an independent contractor rather than an employee and that the company likely lacked possession, custody, or control over his personal devices. The court further found that the request was not proportional to the needs of the case under Rule 26(b)(1). At the same time, the court ordered production of the litigation-hold notice and response, as well as certain documents previously withheld for privilege after reviewing them in camera.
For eDiscovery professionals, the decision underscores several recurring themes: preservation duties attach when litigation is reasonably anticipated; contractors and consultants can be critical custodians; server migrations and system transitions must account for active holds; and inaccurate statements about device usage can amplify exposure. Most importantly, issuing a litigation hold is not enough, organizations must implement defensible preservation processes that ensure ESI is actually retained.
Reach out to Caitlin Oyler, Counsel at CODISCOVR. Caitlin has over a decade of experience providing high-level advice to clients regarding all phases of the eDiscovery life cycle and managing high-profile document collections, reviews, and productions.
