A key custodian left the company—how do we preserve and collect their email and files after they're gone?

A departing employee is one of the most common ways relevant evidence quietly disappears. Accounts get deactivated, mailboxes are deleted, laptops are wiped and reissued, and personal cloud storage walks out the door. If that custodian’s information is subject to a preservation duty, losing it can amount to spoliation. The key is to act before offboarding completes — and to treat exiting custodians as a standing process, not a fire drill.

Preserve first, collect second

If litigation, an investigation, or an audit is reasonably anticipated, the duty to preserve attaches regardless of whether the person still works there. Identify the departed custodian as a hold target and document the steps you take.

• Freeze the accounts. Coordinate with IT to suspend, not delete, the email mailbox and file shares. Place them in a litigation-hold or retention state so automated cleanup and license reclamation do not purge them.
• Capture the endpoints. Image or quarantine the laptop and any mobile devices before they are wiped or reissued.
• Map the data. Look beyond the inbox: home directories, collaboration sites, chat and messaging history, voicemail, and any sanctioned cloud or personal accounts used for work.

Collect defensibly

Once preservation is secured, collection can proceed in a measured way. Use repeatable, documented methods that maintain chain of custody and preserve metadata (sender, dates, file paths). Avoid having a manager casually forward files — that breaks integrity and invites disputes about completeness or alteration.

Build it into offboarding

The reliable fix is procedural. Records, legal, and IT should agree on a checklist triggered by every departure: check whether the person is under any hold, route preservation through a defined workflow, and apply a hold period before deprovisioning. This is squarely an information-governance function — the same discipline that lets an organization dispose of records on schedule lets it reliably suspend that disposition when needed.

Know the limits

Specific obligations, timing, and sanctions for failing to preserve are governed by procedural rules and case law that vary by jurisdiction — U.S. federal civil matters, state courts, and other countries each differ. Confirm requirements with counsel for your matter.

For broader context, see e-discovery.