Opinion ID: 2599511
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Application to Jacor

Text: The trial court concluded that Jacor's employees who learned the identities of Boyles's sources had to disclose the information about Boyles's sources even though the employees learned the information about the sources in communications with Boyles's and Jacor's joint counsel. The court determined that the identities of Boyles's sources were merely facts underlying attorney-client communications because they were wholly unnecessary to Jacor's representation. Thus, because the identities of Boyles's sources are factual information and not communications central to receiving and dispensing legal advice, the trial court refused to allow Jacor's employees to claim that the attorney-client privilege protected them from disclosing the information about Boyles's sources. Although we agree with the trial court that, generally speaking, factual information revealed to an attorney does not become privilege merely because it has been revealed to counsel, we disagree with its conclusion that the attorney-client privilege does not protect Jacor's employees from having to reveal the identities of Boyles's sources. As discussed, the scope of the attorney-client privilege does not encompass otherwise unprivileged facts disclosed in attorney-client relations, and unprivileged facts cannot become privileged merely by incorporation into a communication with an attorney. See Westinghouse, 205 F.Supp. at 831. Aside from Boyles's claims of the newsperson's privilege, the identities of Boyles's sources were not privileged information. Thus, because otherwise unprivileged factual information does not become privileged simply because a client divulges the information to an attorney, the trial court correctly determined that the information about Boyles's sources was not privileged merely because Boyles revealed his sources to his attorney. Nevertheless, the information Larsen and Olinger learned about Boyles's sources is privileged because Jacor's employees learned the information about Boyles's sources only in a meeting with a co-defendant and their joint attorney during communications concerning a matter of common interest to their joint defense. The co-defendants or joint clients application of the attorney-client privilege extends the privilege to communications made between co-defendants and the attorney who represents them both, for the sake of discussing their common interests in a joint defense in civil or criminal litigation. See, e.g., Aetna Cas. & Sur. Co. v. Certain Underwriters at Lloyd's London, 176 Misc.2d 605, 676 N.Y.S.2d 727, 732 (N.Y.Sup. Ct.1998) (applying New York's common interest test to determine whether attorney-client communications between co-defendants in a civil case are privileged). [18] The principles that support the attorney-client privilege apply equally when two or more defendants conduct a joint defense through the same attorney: co-defendants should be encouraged to disclose all information and openly discuss legal strategies with their shared attorney to promote both the complete development of their defense and the efficient administration of justice. [19] See id. Thus, although we have not previously recognized this application of the attorney-client privilege, we hold that it is consistent with and promotes the policies underlying Colorado's attorney-client privilege pursuant to section 13-90-107(1)(b). The fact that Jacor's communications with counsel took place in front of a third party, Boyles, does not destroy the confidentiality of the communications because Boyles was a co-defendant discussing legal matters of common interest for both Jacor and Boyles. See Bank Brussels Lambert v. Credit Lyonnais, (Suisse ) S.A., 160 F.R.D. 437 at 446 (1995). Jacor learned the identities of the sources when Larsen and Olinger met with Boyles and the attorney shared by Boyles and Jacor to discuss the draft of Gordon's complaint, which named Jacor and Boyles as co-defendants. Because Jacor learned the identities of Boyles's sources solely in the context of privileged attorney-client communications, Jacor cannot be compelled to disclose Boyles's sources pursuant to section 13-90-107(1)(b). Thus, we make our rule absolute and vacate the trial court's order that Jacor disclose Boyles's sources.