NACDL/Association of Corporate Counsel Joint Survey on Attorney Client Privilege

The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Association of Corporate Counsel's recently joined forced to survey in-house counsel and NACDL members about the attorney-client privilege. Highlights of the survey include:

--Nearly 75 percent of both inside and outside counsel agree that a “culture of waiver” has evolved in which government agencies expect a company under investigation to waive legal privileges.

--In the past five years, approximately 30 percent of in-house counsel and 51 percent of outside counsel confirmed that the government expected waiver in order to engage in bargaining or be eligible for more lenient treatment.

--Nearly three-quarters of outside counsel said that the expectation of privilege waiver was communicated rather than implied. Of those, 26 percent said that waiver was requested as a direct and specific statement that waiver was a condition precedent for cooperation.

Here is the full article from NACDL. [Mark Godsey]