Sanction Upheld for Lawyer who Told Client of Trade Secret in Public Court File

Legal Ethics

Sanction Upheld for Lawyer who Told Client of Trade Secret in Public Court File

Posted Dec 1, 2008, 10:08 am CDT
By Debra Cassens Weiss

A California appeals court has upheld sanctions nearing $44,000 against a lawyer who told her client that a company trade secret had been exposed in a public court file.

The court said lawyer Joanna Mendoza of Sacramento violated a protective order when she told her client about the document and then filed a court motion pointing out the disclosure, the Recorder reports. The story gives the background of the case and summarizes the decision.

The client had filed a suit against her former employer, PHL Associates Inc., that contended it was profiting from a cow vaccine that she had invented, the story says. PHL countersued, claiming the employee had stolen its trade secret.

After the trade secret ended up in the public court file despite an attempt to file it under seal, Mendoza told her client and filed a motion that read, "if PHL ever had trade secrets, it does not anymore as a direct result of a huge violation of the protective order."

But the appeals court said it was Mendoza who violated the protective order, according to the story. She "acted surreptitiously to have her clients or others ... view the contents ... while they appeared unprotected in the court file in order to argue later that the trade secrets had been made public,” the appeals court said.

Mendoza told the Recorder that she had warned opposing lawyers several times about the disclosure but they called her warnings “background noise.” She also said she consulted an ethics hotline and determined she had to tell her client that the document was part of the public court file.

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