Opinion ID: 1862647
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Other authorities concerning waiver of work product privilege.

Text: Other authorities have considered whether the subject matter waiver rule applied in the attorney-client privilege context likewise applies to the work product privilege such that waiver of the work product privilege as to certain matters extends to all other documents in the attorney's possession on that same subject. See, e.g., United States v. Nobles, 422 U.S. 225, 239, 95 S.Ct. 2160, 2170-71, 45 L.Ed.2d 141, 154 (1975) (stating that defendant, by electing to present [an] investigator as a witness, waived the [work product] privilege with respect to matters covered in [the investigator's] file); Pittman, 129 F.3d at 988 (stating that disclosure to an adversary waives work product protection as to items actually disclosed, but rejecting argument that by voluntarily disclosing photographs and measurements of railroad crossing accident scene, defendant waived work product privilege for entire contents of investigator's file; waiver of work product privilege was limited to photographs actually disclosed); Martin Marietta, 856 F.2d at 625-26 (holding that by disclosing documents to government, party impliedly waived work product privilege as to all non-opinion work product on the same subject matter disclosed, but subject matter waiver rule does not apply to opinion work product); Duplan Corp. v. Deering Milliken, Inc., 540 F.2d 1215, 1222-23 (4th Cir.1976) (stating that broad concepts of subject matter waiver analogous to those applicable to claims of attorney-client privilege are inappropriate when applied to the work product privilege; holding that subject matter waiver does not extend to case where there has only been inadvertent or partial disclosure and in which no testimonial use has been made of the work product); United States v. Skeddle, 989 F.Supp. 917, 921 (N.D.Ohio 1997) (holding that company general counsel's testimony in criminal case against former directors and officers of company did not waive work product privilege as to company's entire investigative file prepared during investigation of claims of self-dealing; company's entire investigative file was not the same subject matter as the limited testimony of counsel); In re United Mine Workers of America Employee Benefit Plans Litig., 159 F.R.D. 307, 310, 312 (D.D.C.1994) (citing rule that disclosure of documents protected by attorney work product privilege waives the protections of the privilege as to the documents disclosed, but holding that such disclosure does not extend to other work product documents still in the possession of the party asserting the privilege); Fleet Nat'l Bank v. Tonneson & Co., 150 F.R.D. 10, 16 (D.Mass.1993) (even if inadvertent disclosure of one group of documents waived work product privilege as to those documents, there was no subject matter waiver of privilege as to other groups of documents); 8 Charles A. Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Richard R. Marcus, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2016.2, at 245-46 (2d ed.1994) (waiver is limited to matters actually disclosed), § 2024, at 368-69 (disclosure of some documents does not destroy work-product protection for other documents of the same character; disclosure of documents to third person does not waive work-product immunity unless disclosure substantially increases the opportunities for potential adversaries to obtain the information).