When federal agents execute a warrant for paper documents during an investigation of a company, they generally seize only the documents in the warrant and leave the rest of the physical documents behind. Where it is not practical to search on site, the law permits them to take all the records and review them later. However, even in that case, once the agents have conducted the search, they return the documents that the warrant does not cover. However, this does not necessarily apply to a computer or other digital media because the agents cannot cut off a piece of a physical hard drive. Thus, agents either keep the entire physical hard drive or make a perfect copy of all its information.
Home > Federal Law Articles > Lawyering > Discovery > Federal Appeals Court in New York to Clarify When Seizures of Computers are Unconstitutional