Individual plaintiffs often exert settlement leverage against corporate defendants because, irrespective of the merits of the suit, the prospective costs of litigation coerce early settlement. Therefore, an individual plaintiff often has nothing to lose. Even if a plaintiff’s suit is meritless, often times the worst case scenario faced is dismissal of the suit. Additionally, where a case is taken on a contingent fee basis, an individual plaintiff is merely left where they started. However, Taylor v. Mitre Corp. shows that in some circumstances an individual plaintiff can in fact find himself or herself in a worse position than prior to litigation.

In Taylor, the plaintiff of the same name filed suit against his former employer, The Mitre Corporation, alleging violations of the Family Medical Leave Act and Americans with Disabilities Act. However, it was Taylor that was soon on the defensive. First, Taylor was accused of spoliating evidence when he smashed a work computer with a sledge hammer. It is not clear what sanctions resulted from this conduct; however, the court did not remain quiet following Taylor’s later response to the Magistrate Judge’s ordering Taylor to produce his laptop for inspection. Upon issuance of the order, Taylor promptly ran specialized programs—Evidence Eliminator and CCleaner—on his computer for the clear purpose of deleting relevant data and information.

Upon learning of Taylor’s second act of spoliation, the court sanctioned Taylor by dismissing his suit. A severe sanction, of course, but it is arguable whether dismissal alone serves as an effective deterrent to future spoliation of evidence. After all, if a plaintiff has extensively spoliated evidence, it is likely that a plaintiff’s case was not meritorious in the first place. Additionally, dismissing a non-meritorious suit will merely leave the plaintiff where he started and leave the defendant out a bundle of unnecessary litigation costs.

Accordingly, the court not only dismissed Taylor’s suit but also found him responsible for Mitre’s reasonable fees and costs associated with the motion for sanctions—$202,399.66 in total. The court arrived at this total by applying the lodestar methodology and was not swayed by Taylor’s claim of financial hardship. It is believable that an individual plaintiff will be hard-pressed to pay such costs; however, the court reasoned that reducing an award of fees and costs is appropriate where the full sanction will have a chilling effect on the filing of future, potentially meritorious, claims. The court found that imposing sanctions for bad-faith spoliation would not have such a chilling effect, and therefore refused to reduce the award in favor of Mitre.

So what’s the moral of the story? In many cases a plaintiff will have little to lose and the nuisance value of their suit places them in strong settlement position. But conduct by the plaintiff in bad-faith can quickly shift this leverage.

Adam L. Peterson is a graduate of Seton Hall University School of Law (Class of 2014). Adam was a member of the Seton Hall Law Review and, prior to law school, Adam was an Environmental Analyst with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.