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SJC-11817

EUNICE FIELD vs. COMMONWEALTH.

December 1, 2015.

Supreme Judicial Court, Superintendence of inferior courts.

Practice, Criminal, Assistance of counsel, Admissions and 

confessions, Voluntariness of statement. Mental Health. 

Witness, Expert, Privilege. Privileged Communication.

Evidence, Expert opinion, Medical record, State of mind, 

Voluntariness of statement, Communication between patient 

and psychotherapist.

Eunice Field appeals from a judgment of a single justice of 

this court denying, without a hearing, her petition for relief 

under G. L. c. 211, § 3. We affirm.

After a trial in the Superior Court, Field was convicted of 

murder in the first degree. Her appeal from that conviction is 

pending in this court and has been stayed pending resolution of 

her motion for a new trial. In that motion, Field argued that 

trial counsel deprived her of effective assistance by failing to 

consult with a psychiatric expert. In a supplemental motion, 

she argued that she was further deprived of effective assistance 

when trial counsel failed to move to suppress her statements to 

the police, in part on the ground that her mental state rendered 

her statements involuntary. On the Commonwealth's motions, the 

trial judge ordered that trial counsel be summonsed to testify 

at the hearing on Field's motion1 and that Field provide the 

Commonwealth with certain discovery, including any of her mental 

health treatment records that were considered by her posttrial

mental health expert in preparing his report. Field's G. L. 

 

1 In doing so, the judge stated that any action on 

assertions of the attorney-client privilege would be taken on a 

question-by-question basis.
2

c. 211, § 3, petition followed, seeking relief from these 

orders.

The case is before us pursuant to S.J.C. Rule 2:21, as 

amended, 434 Mass. 1301 (2001), which requires an appellant 

seeking relief from interlocutory rulings of the trial court to 

"set forth the reasons why review of the trial court decision 

cannot adequately be obtained on appeal from any final adverse 

judgment in the trial court or by other available means." Field

asserts that requiring trial counsel to testify would violate 

her attorney-client privilege and that production of her mental 

health treatment records would violate her psychotherapistpatient privilege. Field has an adequate alternative remedy; if 

any evidence is admitted at the hearing in violation of Field's 

privileges, the error can be remedied on appeal from any adverse 

ruling on the motion for a new trial.2 Claims of privilege are 

routinely addressed in the ordinary appellate process. See

Commonwealth v. Sliech-Brodeur, 457 Mass. 300, 329 (2010) 

(defendant's prior attorney's testimony violated attorney-client 

privilege); Murray v. Karzon, 423 Mass. 1007, 1008 (1996) 

(extraordinary relief under G. L. c. 211, § 3, not warranted 

despite claim that disclosure would cause irreparable breach of 

confidentiality of records). The single justice neither erred 

nor abused her discretion by denying extraordinary relief.

Judgment affirmed.

The case was submitted on the papers filed, accompanied by 

a memorandum of law.

Elizabeth Caddick for the petitioner.

 

2 If the motion for a new trial is denied, Field's appeal 

therefrom presumably will be consolidated with her direct appeal 

from her conviction.