Burns v. Hale & Dorr LLP

242 F.R.D. 170, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 40220
CourtDistrict Court, D. Massachusetts
DecidedMay 14, 2007
DocketCivil Action No. 05-11113-NMG
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 242 F.R.D. 170 (Burns v. Hale & Dorr LLP) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Massachusetts primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Burns v. Hale & Dorr LLP, 242 F.R.D. 170, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 40220 (D. Mass. 2007).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM & ORDER

GORTON, District Judge.

A motion to compel and several related discovery motions are pending in this action. The lawsuit was commenced by the Office of Public Guardian (“the OPG”) on behalf of the plaintiff, Alexis J. Burns, against the law firm Hale and Dorr LLP (“H & D”), its successor Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP (“Wilmer”), Haldor Investment Advisors LP (“Haldor”) and its successor Hale and Dorr Capital Management LLC (“H & D Capital”). The pending motions are resolved as follows.

I. Background

Burns, a young woman who suffers from cerebral palsy which resulted from difficulties at birth, was awarded a judgment in May, 1999, of approximately $2.5 million in a lawsuit against physicians for medical malpractice. Acting on her behalf, Burns’s attorney at the time entered into an agreement with H & D whereby that firm was to create a trust for her benefit (“the Trust”). According to the agreement, the judgment proceeds were to constitute the res of the Trust (“the Trust Funds”).

H & D promptly drafted a declaration of trust (“the Declaration”) which provided that H & D’s investment affiliate, Haldor, would manage the Trust Funds and that two trustees would be appointed to make distributions for the benefit of Burns during her lifetime. Burns’s father, David Burns (“Mr. Burns”), was to be one trustee while the other was to be an independent party. The Trust Funds were delivered to H & D and deposited into a trust account. Although the [172]*172Declaration was supposed to be signed by Mr. Burns as the declarant, and by both trustees in their fiduciary capacities, Mr. Burns never signed the Declaration and a second trustee was never appointed.

Despite their failure to have the Declaration executed, Haldor and/or H & D distributed approximately $1.6 million of the Trust Funds to Mr. Burns, at his request, between May, 1999 and April, 2003. In April, 2003, defendants learned that Mr. Burns was incarcerated in New Hampshire. Plaintiff alleges that defendants disbursed the subject Trust Funds to Mr. Burns without requiring him to demonstrate that the money would be used for his daughter’s benefit and that, in fact, the funds were not properly expended. As of July 31, 2003, the balance of the Trust was approximately $640,000 and shortly thereafter the Trust Funds were transferred to an account under the control of the OPG.

Burns filed an initial complaint against defendants in May, 2005, asserting counts for negligence, breach of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment, money had and received and violations of the Massachusetts Consumer Protection Act, Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 93A (hereinafter, “Chapter 93A”). The purported liability of Wilmer and H & D Capital is premised, at least in part, on their status as successors-in-interest to H & D and Haldor, respectively. Plaintiff filed an amended complaint in October, 2005 and, on July 21, 2006, this Court denied the defendants’ joint motion for partial judgment on the pleadings.

In October, 2006, the plaintiff filed motions to compel certain discovery, to amend the complaint for the second time and to amend the scheduling order, all of which motions are opposed. Several other procedural motions are also pending.

II. Analysis

A. Motion to Compel

The plaintiff seeks an order compelling the defendants to produce documents and to provide deposition testimony relating to an internal investigation conducted by H & D while it continued to manage the Trust Funds on behalf of Alexis Burns. H & D contends that the documents in question are subject to the attorney-client privilege.

The plaintiff advances three arguments as to why the attorney-client privilege does not apply to this situation: 1) the privilege does not apply when a law firm conducts an investigation of its own client while continuing to represent that client, 2) the plaintiff, Alexis Burns, was H & D’s “true client” and 3) the' defendants have waived the privilege.

1. Application of the Privilege

In April, 2003, upon learning that Mr. Burns was incarcerated, in-house counsel at H & D, Michael Heyison, advised H & D partners on the firm’s potential liability. The defendants take the position that, from the moment they first learned in April, 2003 that Mr. Burns was incarcerated through August, 2003, all communications between Mr. Heyison and his partners and/or other employees of the defendants are protected from discovery by the attorney-client privilege.

The plaintiff cites two cases in which courts have held that the attorney-client privilege does not apply when a law firm continues to represent its client while conducting an internal investigation that relates to the firm’s representation of that client. See Bank Brussels Lambert v. Credit Lyonnais (Suisse), S.A., 220 F.Suppüd 283 (S.D.N.Y.2002); Koen Book Distributors v. Powell, Trachtman, Logan, Carrle, Bowman & Lombardo, P.C., 212 F.R.D. 283 (E.D.Pa. 2002).

In Bank Brussels, a law firm represented the defendant in an action brought by a third party. During the course of its representation, the law firm conducted an internal investigation to determine if it might be liable to its client for malpractice if the client were found liable to the third party. The client subsequently brought a malpractice claim against the firm and requested documents relating to that investigation. The firm asserted the attorney-client privilege but the Court rejected the assertion, concluding that the firm could not claim a privilege against its own client. See 220 F.Supp.2d at 287.

[173]*173Similarly, in Koen, a client informed the law firm representing him that he was considering a malpractice suit against the firm. Several lawyers within the firm consulted regarding the firm’s potential liability to the client while the firm continued to represent him. When the client brought suit against the firm, he sought discovery of the firm’s own investigation of its potential liability and the Court found that the attorney-client privilege did not apply because the firm owed a fiduciary duty to its client while representation of that client was ongoing. The Court also concluded that the firm could have avoided the dilemma by withdrawing from its representation or obtaining its client’s consent to continue the representation. See 212 F.R.D. at 285-86.

The plaintiff here contends that the instant case is similar to those cases because H & D and/or Haldor owed a fiduciary duty to Alexis Burns as beneficiary of the Trust. While this case does not involve alleged malpractice, the plaintiff argues that Haldor had a fiduciary obligation to Alexis and that H & D ought not be able to assert a privilege against one to whom it owed a fiduciary duty. That argument merges into the plaintiffs second contention, discussed more fully below, that Alexis was the “true client” of H & D.

Although the facts of this case do not square exactly with the cases cited, which, in turn, are not binding on this Court, the principle is, in essence, the same and the reasoning is compelling. Haldor held, managed and invested the Trust Funds for the benefit of Alexis Burns. It now seeks to shield from discovery documents prepared in anticipation of a possible lawsuit by Alexis Burns. H & D contends that it owes no duty to Ms.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
242 F.R.D. 170, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 40220, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/burns-v-hale-dorr-llp-mad-2007.