Attorney- client privilege was established to prevent the disclosure of any documents that contain confidential communications between an attorney and his or her client (Edna Selan Epstein, 2001).
According to one widely accepted formulation, the general principle of the attorney- client privilege is as follows:
(1) Where legal advice of any kind is sought
(2) from a professional legal adviser in his capacity as such,
(3) the communications relating to that purpose,
(4) made in confidence
(5) by the client,
(6) are at his instance permanently protected
(7) from disclosure by himself or by the legal adviser,
(8) except the protection be waived.
http://nersp.nerdc.ufl.edu/~malavet/civpro/notes/part08.htm
Along with an independent judiciary, the sacrosanctness of the confidential relationship between a lawyer and his or her client are bastions of an ordered liberty. Yet the protection from compelled disclosure accorded to the attorney-client relationship is predicated upon the tacit assumption that lawyers are consulted for the purpose of abiding by rather than in order to devise means to break the law. As the fundamental trust that a society reposes in lawyers, rightly or wrongly, erodes, so too will erode the protection afforded by the attorney- client privilege.
The attorney- client privilege is the oldest of the testimonial privileges protecting confidential communications. It was accepted as early as the reign of Elizabeth I. The purpose of the privilege was to prevent the attorney from being required to take an oath and testify against his client. It was then considered that such testimony against one to whom loyalty was owed would violate the attorney’s honor as a gentleman. Accordingly, the attorney, rather than the client, held and asserted the privilege. (J. Wigmore, Evidence (McNaughton rev., 1961): §2290 at 542–543).
ATTORNEY-CLIENT PRIVILEGE EXTENDS to accountants under the Kovel rule when a CPA acts at the direction.......
