Insurance Company Ordered To Turn Privilege Documents Over To Its Own Attorneys.

In a wrongful termination action, an insurance company defendant withheld or redacted documents requested on the ground they contain privileged or confidential information. Further, the insurance company insisted parties could not disclose the information, even to their own attorneys in the case. The superior court ordered the document in each party’s possession could be disclosed to their respective attorneys, and required the insurance company to provide its responsive documents to its attorneys to ascertain whether the material was privileged and to comply with its discovery obligations. The insurance requested extraordinary relief from the appellate court.  The appellate court denied the petition, stating: “We hold that, for the limited purposes ordered by the trial court, the court did not err in permitting the parties (and requiring Chubb) to disclose the documents to their respective attorneys in this case. Based on the record before us, there is no meaningful distinction between an allegation of privilege as to a party’s information and an allegation of privilege as to a third party’s information.” (Chubb & Son v. Sup. Ct. (Tracy Lemmon) (Cal. App. First Dist., Div. 5; August 12, 2014) 228 Cal.App.4th 1094, [176 Cal.Rptr.3d 389].)