Mazzocchi v. Windsor Owners Corp.

Background

The court reviewed unredacted documents submitted as an exhibit to defendants’ counsel’s letter. The purpose was to determine whether the defendants had redacted too much material and, if so, which text should be provided to plaintiff’s counsel. The documents were emails involving members of the Windsor Owners Corp. Board and others. The defendants relied on the attorney-client privilege, which protects confidential communications between a client and a lawyer made to obtain or provide legal advice.

Document-by-document findings

For EP00043, EP00044, EP00045, EP00052, EP00059, and EP00062, the court found that the redacted portions did not involve requests for or communications of legal advice from a lawyer acting for Windsor. The court therefore found that the plaintiff should receive unredacted versions of those documents. The court rejected the defendants’ argument that copying Windsor’s lawyer on an email made the communication privileged.

For EP00047 through EP00049, the court found that some redactions were proper. In EP00047 and EP00049, the three lines after “But I do lack professional respect for him” could remain redacted because they discussed legal advice given to the Windsor Board. In EP00048, the contents after the first line could remain redacted because they discussed legal advice from Windsor’s lawyers. The plaintiff was to receive versions of those pages containing only those specified redactions.

For EP00055, the court allowed redaction of the portion of the 11:33 a.m. email after its second line because it concerned communications with a co-defendant’s lawyer and planned discussions about legal strategy. The court also allowed redaction of the sentence beginning with “However” in the first line of the 11:05 a.m. email because it contained legal advice from a co-defendant’s lawyer. The plaintiff was to receive a version containing only those redactions.

For EP00068, the court found that many redactions lacked a privilege basis. It nevertheless allowed the first seven lines of the email sent at 11:20 a.m. on September 7, 2013, to remain redacted because they concerned legal advice to be sought from another Windsor lawyer. The plaintiff was to receive a version containing only that redaction.

Privilege waiver and access to filings

The plaintiff argued that the defendants waived the attorney-client privilege by accidentally filing unredacted versions of the emails on the public docket. The court rejected that argument. It found that the filing error was inadvertent and that defendants’ counsel took reasonable steps to prevent further disclosure and correct the error. The court also stated that, even if the filing did not meet the rule’s definition of inadvertence, the privilege was not waived under the circumstances.

Because the unredacted exhibit contained some privileged communications, Judge Stewart D. Aaron requested that the Clerk of Court keep Exhibit A to the defendants’ letter under seal. He requested that the defendants’ July 7, 2020 letter and Exhibit B, which contained the redacted documents, be available for public viewing.