Case Name: Joanne B. CUILLO, Petitioner, v. Robert S. CUILLO, Respondent
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1993-04-01
Citations: 621 So. 2d 460
Docket Number: No. 93-0725
Parties: Joanne B. CUILLO, Petitioner, v. Robert S. CUILLO, Respondent.
Judges: WARNER, J., concurs.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 621
Pages: 460–464

Head Matter:
Joanne B. CUILLO, Petitioner, v. Robert S. CUILLO, Respondent.
No. 93-0725.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.
April 1, 1993.
Order Denying Rehearing May 19, 1993.
Ronald Sales of the Law Office of Ronald Sales, P.A., West Palm Beach, for petitioner.
Joel M. Weissman of Weissman and Ma-noff, P.A., West Palm Beach, for respondent.

Opinion:
KLEIN, Judge.
By petition for writ of common law cer-tiorari, the wife seeks review of an order requiring her and her former lawyer to answer questions which she claims are protected by the lawyer-client privilege. We grant review and quash the order.
The parties were married in 1987 after executing an antenuptial agreement. The wife filed this dissolution action and seeks to invalidate the agreement because (1) the husband misrepresented his finances, and (2) he promised her he would not enforce the agreement.
The wife's lawyer when the agreement was negotiated and signed was Sidney Dubbin. The order which is the subject of this review requires the wife and her former lawyer to answer discovery questions as follows:
Any conversations which Dubbin had with the wife's lawyer, Ronald Sales, (hereinafter the wife's lawyer) recently regarding whatever Dubbin might know about the case is fair game for inquiry because it is not privileged. Dubbin shall answer questions about this conversation where the wife's lawyer spoke to him about what he knew about the case or the agreement. Those are not privileged and can and shall be answered.
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The wife shall answer any questions put to her regarding conversations she had with Dubbin prior to the signing of the agreement or with Dubbin in her lawyer's presence after the signing of the agreement or with Dubbin in the presence of third parties, because none of those conversations are privileged or the privilege must be waived by the wife for her to maintain the claims that she makes to the invalidity of the agreement. She can choose to stand on the privilege. The court cannot waive it or require her to speak but if she chooses to continue to stand on the privilege that is being asserted, then the court must consider and may very well have to strike her claims that the antenuptial agreement is invalid.
The husband first argues review is premature since the trial court's order gives the wife the option of withdrawing her claims regarding invalidity of the ante-nuptial agreement as an alternative to revealing lawyer-client discussions. This argument is unconvincing because the wife may feel coerced to disclose this confidential information in order to litigate her case, and it would not be reparable by final appeal. Moreover, being deprived of a claim or defense is usually the alternative (as a sanction) of not disclosing confidential information under a court order.
In contending that he is entitled to this information, the husband relies on Savino v. Luciano, 92 So.2d 817, 819 (Fla.1957). In that case plaintiff sued defendant for an accounting of money owed under an employment agreement, and defendant alleged as an affirmative defense and counterclaim that an audit prepared by a CPA reflected that plaintiff had embezzled funds. When plaintiff attempted to discover the audit information from the CPA he was met with the claim of accountant-client privilege. Our Supreme Court held that there was a waiver of the privilege under those circumstances, stating:
And when a party has filed a claim, based upon a matter ordinarily privileged, the proof of which will necessarily require that the privileged matter be offered in evidence, we think that he has waived his right to insist, in pretrial discovery proceedings, that the matter was privileged.
The essence of the holding in Savino was that since the defendant would be relying on the CPA's audit to prove his defense and counterclaim, the privilege normally associated with this information was waived. We do not think the information the husband is seeking in the present case rises to the level of that in Savino. In the present case the wife claims that at the time the agreement was executed the husband misrepresented his finances and promised her he would not enforce the agreement. These claims are not based on privileged information. They can be proved without resort to communications between the wife and her lawyer at the time.
The husband argues that what went on between the wife and her lawyer at the time would be relevant to what she knew or relied on regarding his representations of his finances. While the wife may have acknowledged to her lawyer that she knew the true financial picture, we do not think discovery of this type of information is authorized by Savino, 92 So.2d at 817, or section 90.502(4)(a), Florida Statutes (1991), which says there is no lawyer-client privilege when:
[t]he services of the lawyer were sought or obtained to enable or aid anyone to commit or plan to commit what the client knew was a crime or fraud.
In Skorman v. Hovnanian of Fla., Inc., 382 So.2d 1376 (Fla. 4th DCA 1980), a contract for sale of real estate was subject to certain contingencies, which allegedly did not occur, resulting in litigation. The seller moved to produce all correspondence between the buyer and the law firm representing buyer when buyer entered into the contract, which the trial court granted. This court quashed the order and held this information was privileged. We see no distinction between Skorman and the present case. In either situation there is a possibility that the credibility of a party could be impeached by conversations between the party and counsel when the contract was negotiated. The fact that privileged communications occur in the course of a transaction which is later litigated does not eliminate the privilege. Florida Mining & Materials Corp. v. Continental Casualty Co., 556 So.2d 518 (Fla. 2d DCA 1990).
The order is quashed insofar as it requires the wife to answer questions about her conversations with Dubbin, or insofar as it requires that Dubbin answer questions about his conversations with wife's trial lawyer. This opinion does not, of course, pertain to any conversations which would not have been privileged in the first place as, for example, where they occurred in the presence of disinterested third persons.
WARNER, J., concurs.
FARMER, J., concurs specially with opinion.