Ninth Circuit Announces Enhanced Ground Rules For Computer Searches

The federal government's long-running investigation into steroid use in Major League Baseball has yielded more than just newspaper headlines and embarrassed sluggers.  Last week, an en banc panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reviewing the steroid investigation announced new and enhanced guidelines applicable to all search warrants for electronically stored information ("ESI") in the Ninth Circuit.  U.S. v. Comprehensive Drug Testing, Inc., __ F.3d __, 2009 WL 2605378 (9th Cir. Aug. 26, 2009).  The decision is important to companies and their counsel because ESI now dominates most white collar criminal investigations.  The decision sets clear ground rules that give teeth to the Fourth Amendment and help protect companies and management from government overreaching in this area.