In a recent New York case, Patterson v. Turner Construction Co., the court ruled that a plaintiff's Facebook postings may be discoverable, at least to the extent the Facebook postings are relevant to plaintiff's damage claims (see the ruling here).
While this case is not binding on California courts, a California court is likely to reach a similar ruling. We have already encoutered several cases, mostly concerning younger plaintiffs, where the plaintiff's social media postings were at issue to show the extent to which the plaintiff's injuries affected their life and the extent to which the plaintiff was injured. Any injured party would be well served to think about what they post on the internet, even if their social media postings are supposed to be "private."
This is a blog from Kenneth Tanji, Jr., of LT Pacific Law Group LLP. We are experienced personal injury/accident; employment; patent; copyright; trademark; and business lawyers. We are headquartered in City of Industry (Los Angeles) and also service the Long Beach/Compton area. For more information, see our website at www.ltpacificlaw.com or call us at (562) 284-7748 or (626) 810-7200. Para hablar en español, llame a nuestro asistente legal, Carlos Reyes, al (562) 284-7748