Judge Richard G. Andrews recently denied defendants’ Daubert motion to exclude the testimony of plaintiff’s computer forensics expert. Robocast, Inc. v. Microsoft Corporation, C.A. No. 10-1055-RGA; Robocast, Inc. v. Apple, Inc., C.A. No. 11-235-RGA (D. Del. Jan. 13, 2014). Plaintiff offered this expert in rebuttal to defendants’ computer forensics expert who may testify as to “suspicious metadata” that recorded the creation date of a letter that was “essential” to defendants’ inequitable conduct and unclean hands defenses and that may also impact the date of conception. Id. at 2. Defendants argued that plaintiff’s expert did not “tie his theories to the facts of the case, and that therefore his testimony is not helpful to the jury.” Id. at 1. However, the Court found that “many jurors may indeed be confused by the concept of metadata, and [the expert’s] testimony may be helpful.” Id. at 1-2. The Court also did not find the expert’s theories unreliable. Id. at 3. “The underlying story” behind the expert’s explanation of the metadata “may or may not be plausible. Its status, however, is irrelevant to whether [the expert’s] proposed testimony meets Daubert’s reliability requirement.” Id. at 3 n.3.
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