In 2004, the New York Times reported in a series of award-winning articles how Union Pacific and other major railroads engaged in coverups to hide their responsibility for rail crossing accidents. In one story, the newspaper reported that Union Pacific was sanctioned seven times between July 2001 and January 2003 for destroying or failing to preserve evidence, legally known as spoliation.

Steven Lubet, a law professor who teaches legal ethics at the Northwestern University School of Law, told the Times that Union Pacific's conduct was "extremely unusual."

"There is hardly an excuse for one incident of spoliation, and I can't imagine an excuse for seven," Lubet told the Times.

Lubet declined an interview request from the Star Tribune.

Union Pacific officials told the Times in 2004 that the records had been discarded as part of the railroad's normal business practices, but acknowledged that the railroad wound up destroying evidence that should have been kept. "I think we've learned our lesson," a Union Pacific spokesperson told the Times.

BNSF has complained repeatedly about plaintiffs' attorneys abusing the legal system by making burdensome demands for evidence and deposition testimony. In June, a federal judge in Seattle was so irritated at a noted Minneapolis rail attorney in an injury case brought by a BNSF worker that he ordered him to explain why he shouldn't be disqualified from representing the worker.

Judge James Robart lectured attorney William Jungbauer over "what seems to me to be just complete abuse of the discovery process.'' Jungbauer angered the judge by making demands the judge perceived as overzealous, including requests to conduct more depositions of company officials than is allowed under federal court rules.

In a June 16 response to the court, Jungbauer apologized to the judge and BNSF for his "offensive behavior,'' and he pledged to "behave in accord with both the spirit and the letter of the rules.'' He was allowed to remain on the case.

In an interview, Jungbauer said his conduct was borne out of frustration over BNSF's slow and inadequate production of evidence, including what he said was the railroad's initial refusal to disclose a video of the accident in which his client was injured.

TONY KENNEDY AND PAUL McENROE