Saving Texts for Legal Reasons

[rightisright]

Long story short: I caught wind that some dimwit who used to be in my employ is setting up a civil suit against my company.

Through a series of SMS texts he recently sent me, he basically admitted he is going to be committing fraud by suing me. I told you he was a dimwit...

My question is how do I transpose these texts and/or store them so they are authentic and admissible if he goes through w. the suit?

If it matters, I am using a Droid Bionic on Verizon.

[Precision]

Long story short: I caught wind that some dimwit who used to be in my employ is setting up a civil suit against my company.

Through a series of SMS texts he recently sent me, he basically admitted he is going to be committing fraud by suing me. I told you he was a dimwit...

My question is how do I transpose these texts and/or store them so they are authentic and admissible if he goes through w. the suit?

If it matters, I am using a Droid Bionic on Verizon.

your lawyer can subpeona the phone company to pull the texts if nothing else. how to store them other than that, I have no idea.

[rightisright]

I was under the impression the carriers only store the numbers and the time/length of the text and not the content.

[308Mike]

You *MIGHT* be able to get a printout of all test messages to and from your phone during the last couple of billing periods, especially if it's on a corporate account. Once you know they capture them, ask how long they keep them (they might not store them for more than 6 months or so - mostly for disputing billing issues). Don't be surprised if they won't release anything without a subpoena.

More than likely, none of it will be admissible in court unless the information comes directly from your provider as a result of a subpoena.

Check your provider's website to see if you can find contact information to their legal department. They're used to dealing with subpoenas so it'll be nothing new for them.

GOOD LUCK!!

[Aglifter]

I'd contact corp. counsel and let him tell you how to proceed

[rightisright]

Thanks for the info.

Looks like I'll be calling my lawyer on Monday.

[Denis]

Good luck. Hope you nail the dimwit.

Just one bit of practical advice - whatever you do with/about the phone company, do also get the PC software suite to match your phone, and use it to copy the messages from your phone to your PC. Then you will at least have them copied and backed-up, and in a place and format from which it is easy to print, e-mail etc.

I know of at least one case where such simple records of SMS conversations have been considered sufficient for court use (in a civil matter, and it does depend very much on the attitude of the judge).

[308Mike]

If you don't mind, please let us know what you find out. If you don't want to or can't, *I* understand. A follow-up would be appreciated. THANKS!