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Attorney-Client Privilege

E-Mail to Lawyer Not Privileged Because of Employer Policy

Posted Oct 30, 2007, 08:26 am CDT
By Debra Cassens Weiss

A New York judge has ruled that a hospital’s e-mail policy means messages sent by a physician to his lawyers are not protected by attorney-client privilege.

The policy at Beth Israel Medical Center specified that employees had no personal property right in their messages and the hospital had the right to read and disclose e-mails, the New York Law Journal reports in a story reprinted by New York Lawyer.

Judge Charles Ramos of Manhattan ruled the e-mail sent from a hospital computer could be disclosed in a lawsuit by physician W. Norman Scott that claims he was fired in violation of his contract.

Scott is represented by Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison. The law firm had argued its e-mail confidentiality notice protected the e-mail. But Ramos said the disclaimer “cannot create a right to confidentiality out of whole cloth."

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Comments

  1. Posted by Richard - 10 months, 6 days, 2 hours, 47 minutes ago

    FYI - re the DoD banner issue

  2. Posted by Gretchen Klebasko - 10 months, 6 days, 2 hours, 9 minutes ago

    DNP:  Thought you might be interested in this.

  3. Posted by Mark Carlton - 10 months, 6 days, 2 hours, 1 minute ago

    Joe - You may want to tuck this away.  Often, during mergers, employees use the company’s computers for a variety of things, like communicating with their lawyers.  I have always taken the position those can’t be privileged because the employees are using the company’s computer.

  4. Posted by Bruce - 10 months, 6 days, 1 hour, 39 minutes ago

    Does this mean that an employee’s e-mail to his IN-HOUSE attorney is also not privleged when the company has a similar policy?

  5. Posted by Kennedy - 10 months, 6 days, 27 minutes ago

    Mark’s comment prompted me to think about what ‘the company’s computer’ is ... I’m assuming the MD used his in-house e-mail account, but would mail sent through a private e-mail account, accessed using a company-supplied PC or mobile device, but not through the company network, still be protected?

  6. Posted by David Hudgens - 10 months, 5 days, 23 hours, 17 minutes ago

    Advise your clients to be careful if they are using an employer’s e-mail system for personal legal matters

  7. Posted by judy.daniels@concentra.com; mark.solls@concentra.c - 9 months, 4 weeks, 1 day, 22 hours, 26 minutes ago

    This is good for the company.  We already knew we could access employee’s emails. This case says that employees can’t send privileged emails from Concentra’s system.


Commenting has expired on this post.


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