Reference no: EM133834962

Question

Ann represents Officer Patty in an employment discrimination case against City Police Department ("Department") in which Patty alleges that Department refused to promote her and other female police officers to positions that supervise male police officers. Bob represents Department.

At Patty's request, Ann privately interviewed a male police captain, Carl, who had heard the Chief of Police (Chief) make disparaging comments about women in Department. Carl told Ann that Chief has repeatedly said that he disapproves of women becoming police officers, routinely assigns them clerical work, and would personally see to it that no female officer would ever supervise any male officer. Carl met with Ann voluntarily during his non-work hours at home. Ann did not seek Bob's consent to meet with Carl or invite Bob to be present at Carl's interview.

When Bob saw Carl's name as a trial witness on the pretrial statement, he asked Chief to prepare a memo to him summarizing Carl's personnel history and any information that could be used to discredit him. Chief produced a lengthy memo containing details of Carl's youthful indiscretions. In the memo, however, were several damaging statements by Chief reflecting his negative views about female police officers. In the course of discovery, Bob's paralegal inadvertently delivered a copy of Chiefs memo to Ann. Immediately upon opening the envelope in which the memo was delivered, Ann realized that it had been sent by mistake. At the same time, Bob's paralegal discovered and advised Bob what had happened. Bob promptly demanded the memo's return, but Ann refused, intending to use it at trial.

1. Did Ann commit any ethical violation by interviewing Carl? Discuss.

2. What are Ann's ethical obligations with respect to Chiefs memo? Discuss.

3. At trial, how should the court rule on objections by Bob to the admission of Chiefs memo on the grounds of attorney-client privilege and hearsay? Discuss.