People ex rel. Lockyer v. Superior Court

In People ex rel. Lockyer v. Superior Court (2004) 122 Cal.App.4th 1060, the responding party's response to an inspection demand timely asserted objections based on the attorney-client privilege and work product doctrine, but did not serve a privilege log or otherwise identify the purportedly privileged documents or the factual basis for the privilege claims. The responding party later served a privilege log that identified categories of documents that were allegedly privileged, but did not identify specific documents. (Lockyer, supra, 122 Cal.App.4th at p. 1066.) The propounding party then moved to compel production of the documents that had not been identified on the privilege log with particularity. The trial court overruled the privilege claims and ordered the responding party to produce the documents that were not specifically identified on the log. (Id. at pp. 1068-1070.) The Court of Appeal granted the responding party's petition for a writ of mandate compelling the trial court to vacate its order overruling the objections. (Lockyer, supra, 122 Cal.App.4th at p. 1081.) The Lockyer court explained that the responding party had preserved its objections based on the attorney-client privilege and work product doctrine by timely asserting them in the original response to the inspection demand, and therefore the trial court lacked authority "as a matter of law" to overrule the objections based on any deficiencies in the responding party's initial response or privilege log. (Id. at pp. 1074-1075.) Instead, the propounding party's remedy was to compel the responding party to provide a more detailed privilege log that identified each document with particularity and to present sufficient factual information to allow the propounding party and the court to evaluate each privilege claim. Even if the responding party failed to adequately comply with an order to provide a more detailed privilege log, the Lockyer court emphasized the trial court lacked authority to disregard the privilege objections or find a waiver based on deficiencies in the privilege log. (Id. at p. 1075.)