Court Opinion

ID: 9457946
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 20:39:12.971519+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:35:35.411840
License: Public Domain

GODBOLD, Circuit Judge
(specially concurring):
I concur in the result but with this additional comment concerning the contempt at the motion to suppress hearing. The inquiry into names at that hearing consumed 35 pages of the record. The two brief summarized statements made by Judge Shea and quoted in the opinion of the federal District Judge are insufficient basis on which to predicate a decision in this case. Rather than supporting the correctness of an adjudication of contempt they tend to show the contrary, containing as they seem to me to do, several alternative inquiries. They call for the names of individuals that Glass had personal contact with by reason of his attorney-client relationship with an organization; the names of all persons that Glass spoke to in his attorney-client relationship (presumably, his relationship with the organization); and the names of persons to whom Glass gave legal advice or spoke to as attorney to client in representing the group and the individual as part of the group. These ambiguities go to the heart of the elusive problem that was before the court.1
However, Glass is not entitled to reversal by reason of the ambiguities in what the federal District Judge regarded as a crystal clear explanation of the focal problem. What is perfectly clear from the entire hearing is that Glass considered, because he represented an organization, that he had such relationship with every member of the organization that he was entitled to invoke the attorney-client privilege with respect to *567every member, without regard to whether he was currently handling any particular legal matter or matters for individual members (for some individual members he was, for others he was not). The District Attorney’s position was that he denied the existence of a privilege extending to every individual member, except members for whom Glass currently was serving as attorney for their individual matters, but, alternatively, if the privilege was to be claimed then Glass was required to state the names of the persons with respect to whom it was asserted. These were the positions of the parties. The position of Judge Shea was that Glass could not claim an umbrella of privilege over a number of people while at the same time declining to tell who they were.
The refusal of Glass to reveal the names was unjustified, and the finding of contempt at the motion to suppress hearing was correct.

. Judge Shea’s difficulty in defining, and refining, the question was understandable. Each time he appeared to get the participants precisely on target someone would present a question, or a clarification, qualification or modification, that necessitated a restatement.