Discovery

Legal discovery can be summarized into two primary facets; informal and formal discovery.

Informal discovery, in brief, is the process of gathering information from your client and nonparties. Depending on your case, non-parties might include witnesses, co-workers and employers, acquaintances, public records, and countless other sources. A thorough investigation of any relevant information during informal discovery will help an attorney conduct more probing and focused formal discovery.

Formal discovery is a substantial part of the pre-trial phase of a lawsuit. Regardless of whether such suit is in federal or state court, civil procedure rules are in place that allow each party to a lawsuit to request documents, evidence, and information from other parties through subpoenas or other discovery documents. Such documents include interrogatories and various requests those for production, for admissions, and for inspection or examination. Depending on the complexity of the case, formal discovery may also include the taking of depositions and/or the obtaining of affidavits.

One of the most important things to remember about the discovery process is that its scope is extremely broad-sweeping. Any information, in nearly any form, that is not subject to some sort of legal privilege or other protection is discoverable as long as it is relevant and it reasonably appears that the information will lead to the discovery of admissible evidence.