JOHN HINDERAKER: More On The IRS’s Illegal Destruction Of Evidence. “Under federal law, a party has a duty to preserve data that may be relevant to any actual or likely lawsuit. This duty arises from the party’s own knowledge; it is not necessary for a court to tell it not to destroy information, or for an adverse party to make such a request. The fundamental, shocking fact that is emphasized in True the Vote’s brief is this: at the time of Lois Lerner’s hard drive crash in June 2011, the IRS was already under a legal duty to take steps to ensure that information was not lost, and had been under such a duty for nearly a year, at a minimum. . . . But, according to IRS representatives who have testified before Congressional committees, the IRS ignored the law. Instead of making sure that relevant information was preserved, the IRS blithely continued erasing back-up email tapes every 90 days. Further, the IRS continued its policy of assigning each employee a ridiculously small space on an email server, and then authorizing employees (like Lois Lerner) to delete at will to keep space open. And, finally, when Lerner’s hard drive crashed ten months after the Z Street case was commenced, the IRS made no effort to preserve it, but rather, by its own account, recycled the hard drive in a business-as-usual manner.”