Call Today

Attorney Client Privilege Inadvertently Produced Documents

Ardon v. City of Los AngelesĀ (2016) 62 Cal.4th 1176.
The California Supreme Court held that privileged documents inadvertently produced pursuant to a Public Records Act request can be retracted by the public entity that produced the records.
An attorney representing a plaintiff in a class action seeking tax refunds against the City of LA, was refused certain documents on the basis of privilege in response to formal discovery. The attorney then made a Public Records Act request for those documents and they were produced. This was held to be inadvertent and thus not a waiver of either the attorney-client or the work-product privileges.