missed deadline for defence - extenuating circumstances

[penguin21]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)?
We are a small business contesting a claim and filing defense and counterclaim. We had produced a detailed case but as we came to print out the final amendments ready to hand deliver to the court we had a systems crash and were unable to access the document. We engaged computer engineers and have been attempting data recovery but have been told that the files are all now completely corrupted and we have lost all data. We are frantically trying to piece the information together again as best we can from memory, but it will now be two days after the deadline. We did have a strong case and took seriously the deadline (despite the fact that the person concerned with producing the defense is sick) but are now horrified of course as it seems too awful for this spurious claim against us to succeed as a result of this fateful accident.
Please help - what should we do? Is all lost?

 

[Zigner]

First: US LAW ONLY!

Second: Your improper back-ups does not present an extenuating circumstance, as you claim.

 

[cosine]

A forgiving judge (and there are many around) might well give you a grace period for this. Try for it. But prudent practice would have you keeping regular backups on all computers. I work in the computer service business and do this all the time. Everything is backed up at least daily, to multiple copies, and archived for extended periods. Some things, like mail servers, are backed up hourly.