What is Discovery in civil or commercial litigation?

Discovery is where the Plaintiff and Defendant have a legal right to access all of the relevant information and documents that the other side has prior to trial. Discovery assists the Plaintiff or Defendant whether they want to settle or not.

Discovery also includes a deposition which is also called a "Discovery deposition". Generally, in Illinois, discovery is broken down into two (2) documents called "Production of Documents" and "Interragatories". Production of documents is essentially the documents that the Plaintiff or Defendant possess or may want to use at trial. For example, the Plaintiff mails a three page Production of Documents request to the Defendant for all documents that arise out of the Plaintiff's complaint (lawsuit) and Plaintiff wants to know all the documents that the Defendant may use at trial. Defendant is under a legal duty to disclose all the documents that they may use at trial, or Defendant may be barred from using the information. Production of documents are critical in civil or commercial litigation matters in the Circuit Courts of Cook, Dupage, or Will County. Your civil or commercial litigation attorney should use Production of Document's request to determine how strong their opposing attorney's case is. Often times, discovery request is used as a weapon to run up the legal fees on a Defendant or Plaintiff that may lack funds to properly defend themselves. Thus, the Defendant or Plaintiff's goal is to get the opposing attorney to withdraw from legal representation and beat Defendant or Plaintiff by utilizing the Plaintiff or Defendant's lack of knowledge of the court system.

Interragatories are similar to production of documents except that interragatories request information about interviews or statements that a party may know of or who was present as a witness or know anything about the heart of the complaint or lawsuit. Again, interragatories is seeking to know information, so that side can determine whether they need to interview a witness that they did not know about.

Sean Robertson is a civil and commercial litigation attorney with extensive experience in asset protection and liability protection for individuals, families, and business owners. Sean Robertson can be reached at either (312) 498-6080 or (630) 364-2318. Robertson Law Group, LLC has offices in downtown Chicago and Naperville.