On August 26, 2009, Mindy Olson brought a suit against Michael Sax and Goodwill Industries, claiming that Goodwill violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 “by discriminating against her based on gender and pregnancy when it terminated her employment.” Goodwill fired Olson on the grounds that she had submitted inaccurate credit slips. Olson also called for sanctions against her former employer due to its “failure to preserve a…video tape recording of Olson’s alleged theft of property from Goodwill.” As Goodwill’s video surveillance system only retains records for 29 days, they referenced Rule 37(e), which states that “sanctions may not be imposed…where electronically stored evidence is lost as the result of routine, good faith operation of an electronic information system.”

The courts considered Burlington N. & Santa Fe Ry. Co. v Grant and Silvestri v Gen. Motors Corp in deciding whether the Defendants’ actions merited sanctions. In these previous cases, “spoliation sanctions” were awarded only where a party destroyed evidence because of knowledge of impending litigation and when “evidence was destroyed intentionally.” Even though the Defendant had a “duty to preserve evidence,” Olson’s motion for sanctions was ultimately denied because the court could find no “evidence that Goodwill engaged in ‘bad faith’ destruction of evidence.”