A federal judge has vowed to investigate Google for intentionally destroying chats

Judge James Donato will preside Epic against GoogleIt’s an issue that could determine the future of the Android App Store, but could have bigger implications for Google when it comes to certification.

Judge Donato promised Friday to investigate Google for its deliberate and systematic suppression of evidence, calling the company’s conduct a “direct attack on the fair administration of justice.” We were in court to explain.

“I will find out who is responsible,” he said, adding that he would pursue the cases “on my own, outside of this process.”

Certificate in Epic against Google The trial — and a parallel Justice Department antitrust case against Google in Washington, D.C. — found that Google automatically deleted chat messages between employees and that employees up to CEO Sundar Pichai used it to intentionally hide certain conversations. Pichai and other employees also testified that they did not change the automatic deletion setting even after being advised of their legal obligation to preserve evidence.

Pichai and other employees admitted that they marked the documents as legally confidential simply to keep them out of other people’s hands.

On November 14, Pichai told the court that he relied on his legal and compliance team to guide him properly, particularly Kent Walker, Alphabet’s chief legal officer — and so brought Judge Donato Walker to court two days later.

But the judge was not satisfied with Walker’s statement and accused him of “tap dancing”.

Walker said he never tried to verify whether employees were actually preserving evidence, that he left it up to individual employees to identify communications that might be relevant to a legal case, and that multiple employees testified in court that they had made a lie that was relevant. What ideas.

Today, Judge Donato said it was “deeply disturbing to me as a judge in the United States” that Google acted this way, calling it “the most seriously disturbing evidence I have seen in a case in my decade as a judge.” “Party is intentionally suppressing relevant evidence.”

“This conduct is a direct attack on the fair administration of justice. It undermines due process. It calls into question the fair resolution of legal disputes. It is against our system,” Judge Donato said.

However, the judge ruled today that he would not issue “binding presumptions instructions” — instructions that would tell jurors to proceed on the basis that Google destroyed evidence that could harm their case.

Instead, the jury will have a “lenient” instruction – the jury “might” conclude that the missing evidence helped Epic and hurt Google.

“The best course of action is for the jury to decide for themselves whether to reach a conclusion. “I’m not going to limit the jury’s discretion by offering them that conclusion,” he said.

“Although it would be within the bounds of issuing mandatory evidentiary instructions, I may pursue these issues myself outside of this trial at a later trial,” Judge Donato said.

He added: “I will find out who is responsible.” “It will be separate and distinct from what happens here, but that day is coming.”

Google declined to comment edges Regarding Judge Donato’s statement.

Today, Epic and Google settled their lawsuit Epic against Google. We will return on December 11th for closing arguments and jury instructions.