Court Opinion

ID: 9778695
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 21:16:27.195432+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:12.652736
License: Public Domain

*621DORSEY, Justice,
dissenting.
I disagree with the majority’s conclusion and analysis that information contained in a mental health counselor’s file is discoverable and admissible in this case. The majority applies literally the three part test announced by the Supreme Court in Republic Insurance Co. v. Davis, 856 S.W.2d 158 (Tex.1998), and finds: 1) the plaintiff sought affirmative relief by seeking damages from the defendants, 2) the statement made by the plaintiff to the counselor has great relevance and could well determine the outcome of the case, and 3) the information is not available from other sources.
The Supreme Court’s decision in Ginsberg v. Fifth Court of Appeals, 686 S.W.2d 105, 108 (Tex.1985), is the genesis of the Texas rule that one may waive a privilege by using it offensively. I believe the doctrine is misapplied in the case under consideration.
The majority’s test of “affirmative relief’ is our point of departure. I would hold that the affirmative relief sought must have some relationship to the counseling or treatment sought or received by the patient. That a party seeks any affirmative relief from the court should not constitute a waiver of the privilege. The position of the majority, based on a strict reading of Ginsberg and Republic, has the result that any plaintiff seeking damages or injunctive relief imperils the secrecy of her talks with her therapist, even though her suit is not related to her treatment or counseling. Thus, anyone seeking access to the courts of this state for the redress of grievances, whether it be for contract, trespass, tort, family law matters, or for any other relief, opens her psycho-therapist’s files for review by strangers. This is not the law, nor should it be.
Rule 510 of the Texas Rules of Civil Evidence recognizes the confidentiality of mental health information, and states the general rule of privilege, who may claim it, and the exceptions to the privilege. Rule 510(d)(5) states an exception to the privilege of nondisclosure: when the communication is “relevant to an issue of the physical, mental or emotional condition of the patient in any proceeding in which any party relies upon the condition as a part of the party’s claim or defense.”
The present language of Rule 510(d)(5) was adopted by the Supreme Court in 1988. The version it superseded in 1984 had the same requirement that the condition be relied on as an element of the claim or defense. See Tex.R.Civ.Evid. 510 and accompanying Historical Notes. The rule as originally adopted by the court in 1983 required the patient to attempt to recover damages for a mental condition.
A privilege may be waived by using it offensively; however, there is no need to apply the doctrine when the privilege itself has exceptions. To apply the offensive use doctrine unnecessarily causes confusion in the law, but also, when it is applied improperly, as here, destroys the privilege.
To hold, as the majority does, that the plaintiff has waived the privilege by seeking affirmative relief in the courts is to render the provisions of Rule 510(d)(5) worthless. Both the doctrine announced in Ginsberg, as explained in Republic, and the Rules of Civil Evidence are rules made by the Supreme Court. They should be harmonized so each may be given effect if possible.
In Republic Insurance Co. v. Davis, 856 S.W.2d at 163, the Supreme Court addressed the issue of whether the “offensive use” waiver applied to the attorney-client privilege. It held it did and expounded the three criteria to be applied. However, although the Texas Rules of Civil Evidence provide for the lawyer-client privilege in Rule 503, there is no “offensive use” exception expounded in Rule 503 as there is in Rule 510. The litigant’s actions did not fall within one of the exceptions which are part of the formulation of the pertinent privilege. See 1 Steven Goode, Olin G. Wellborn III & M. Miohael ShaR-lot, Guide To The Texas Rules of Evidence: Civil and Criminal § 511.2 (Texas Practice 1993). To hold that a privilege is waived is to determine its applicability on an ad hoc basis with an objective of fairness.
Even when the privilege of confidential communications has been held to have been waived under the “offensive use” doctrine, the party asserting the privilege has first *622based their claim for legal relief on a matter later claimed to be privileged so the other party could not reach it. There must be some connection, or nexus, between the claim for relief and the privileged matter. See Ginsberg, 686 S.W.2d at 108; West v. Solito, 563 S.W.2d 240 (Tex.1978) (orig. proceeding); Valero Energy v. M.W. Kellogg Constr., 866 S.W.2d 252, 255-56 (Tex.App.—Corpus Christi 1993, writ denied); Westheimer v. Tennant, 831 S.W.2d 880 (Tex.App. — Houston [14th Dist.1992, orig. proceeding); Betts v. Martin, 798 S.W.2d 366 (Tex.App.—Beaumont 1990, orig. proceeding), writ dism’d, improvidently granted, 806 S.W.2d 222 (Tex.1991); Kentucky Fried Chicken Nat’l Management Co. v. Tennant, 782 S.W.2d 318 (Tex.App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 1989, orig. proceeding); Parten v. Brigham, 785 S.W.2d 165, 167-68 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth 1989, orig. proceeding); DeWitt and Rearick, Inc. v. Ferguson, 699 S.W.2d 692, 694 (Tex.App.—El Paso 1985, orig. proceeding).
In Ginsberg, the plaintiff attacked her own deed, saying that she had been tricked and didn’t know what she had been doing. She put her mental processes into issue and then resisted the defendant’s efforts to probe her mental state through her mental health records. Her mental state was an issue she created, and she should not be able to shield the best evidence of it, the professional’s records.
Such a situation does not exist here. Before the auto accident made the subject of this action, Shannon and Srader sought counseling for a substance abuse problem. After the accident, they continued to counsel with Felcyn, the therapist. In those sessions, they discussed the collision and their emotions in its aftermath. Among other things, they spoke about the driver’s behavior immediately prior to the collision which Hyundai claims negates its liability for any product defect. Neither patient is making a claim for mental anguish. There is no connection between their treatment or counseling and the affirmative relief they seek in the courts. Their privilege of confidentiality with their therapist should not be violated in the absence of such a nexus.
I respectfully dissent. I would affirm the judgment.