Data Recovery Liability

Sorry, this is long...

I was in Chicago this weekend and my MBP wouldn't boot and hung at the grey screen before the Apple logo. I spoke with AppleCare and went through all of the troubleshooting steps and the rep said that the logic board most likely needed to be replaced. I pulled the hard drive and put it into an external enclosure to make sure that the drive was good, which it was.

The next morning I went to the Apple store and the genius replaced my MBP. Before he replaced it I asked him if he could back up a few photos for me to a DVD or some other media (I backed up everything before leaving for Chicago, but my photos from the trip weren't backed up). He agreed and left for 30-45 min., but instead of backing up my photos he had put the old drive into the new computer. I tried to explain that that was not what I wanted, but he wasn't hearing it. He handed me a receipt, the box with the MBP, and took his next appt.

I waited about an hour for a manager, but had to leave to catch my flight. While waiting to board my flight I tried using the computer and it hung at the screen with the Apple logo and the gear. I ran disk utility off of a flash drive and the disk was unmountable.

I called AppleCare when I landed and explained what had happened. The rep was not able to find any notes or a case/repair number for my notebook. I was transferred to customer relations and the rep confirmed that the genius had not entered any information regarding the replacement computer. I'm assuming that the genius damaged the drive since he rushed me out and didn't document anything. The receipt he gave me only showed a product exchange (a credit for a return and then purchase with that credit). The customer relations rep called the Apple store and the genius denied swapping the drive. The rep then firmly offered to send me a new hard drive. I said that I would call her back tomorrow morning.

I tried running data recovery software (data rescue, diskwarrior, etc.) and was only able to recover a few files.

The photos on the drive are invaluable and I want them to be recovered. What are my options at this point? Is Apple liable for the data loss and subsequent recovery? The genius didn't show or have me sign a repair invoice, NDA, or liability release. Would Apple offer any sort of compensation to offset the data recovery cost? Or cover the full cost of the data recovery?

On a side note, I've had my 13" MBP replaced 3 times in the past 5 months due to miscellaneous issues (long story).

Thanks in advance.